Failure modeling of a self piercing riveted joint using LS-DYNA

Besides the basic product requirements, the aspect of energy efficiency is in the center of automobile engineering. A mixture of different light weight materials like aluminium and higher strength steels, called multi-material mix, is used increasingly to fulfill these requirements and reduce the weight of the vehicles. Hence the challenges for the joining technique are increasing. Mechanical joining techniques like self piercing riveting have great potential to fulfill this challenge. In particular the joints are the highest loaded parts during crash loading and overloading situations and have to be modeled in crash simulations. Joints are modeled with simplified elements in crash simulations due to efficiency. The simplified models should be able to reproduce the deformation and failure behavior as well as the energy absorption of the joints with less computational cost but with adequate accuracy.