In the field of mechanical analysis, FEA is the most groundbreaking innovation of the 20th century. Since its beginnings in the 1950s and 1960s, developed by pioneers such as Argyris and Zienkiewicz and the Berkeley group led by Clough, the method has developed into the central technique for structural design and verification by analysis.
The essential idea of FEA transforms the intractable problem of describing the deformation behavior of a structure using a global, mathematical approach into an arrangement of finite elements whose local deformations can each be solved. This pioneering approach makes it possible to approximate the global deformation using a limited number of known local shape functions. The intractability of the overarching scientific problem is transformed to the solvability of a finite set of individual engineering problems. The formulation is therefore ideally suited for processing by computers. The importance of FEA in modern structural simulation is therefore closely linked to the rapid development of computer technology.
At the beginning of its industrial use, FEA was a method that required in-depth expert knowledge and programming skills. Since the 1990s, when FEA experienced a tremendous productivity boost through its integration with CAD systems, the method has become accessible to a broader user group. However, this also led to an increase in problems with application errors and misinterpretations by inexperienced operators. FEA is a numerical approximation. Understanding the limitations of the method is essential for its successful application in the engineering domain.