Beam element

The beam element is a mathematical construct used to model beam-type structures. The beam is a common structure used in engineering. The frame of a steel building, the frame of a vehicle street lights can all be described by beams. For these reasons the element is used frequently in finite element analysis.

The typical beam element assumes all loading is discrete at the ends of the beam. In cases where there is intermediate loading, multiple elements are used. If the intermediate loading is distributed, a load lumping scheme needs to be applied to map the forces to the node. In these situations the beam element fails to give the analytical solution for beam deflection.

Provided that a consistent load lumping scheme is applied the element will predict the correct internal forces and displacement at the nodes. Thus by including increasingly more beam elements to a problem, the solution will converge to the exact result.