I am using Kangaroo 2 for form-finding of shells, and wanted to know what form-finding technique is it based upon? While i was unable to find an official documentation related to it online, certain forum posts say that it is based on Dynamic Relaxation. However, while reading about different form-finding methods, Particle Spring system seems more like what Kangaroo is based upon, since the grid is being divided into nodes and edges and then force being applied on to the nodes (for a shell simulation, e.g.). Could somebody clarify, please? Thank you.
Hi @kazim2
My post in the thread @rudolf.neumerkel linked above goes into some more details, but in summary - yes it is based on a modified form of dynamic relaxation.
Particle spring systems and dynamic relaxation are not mutually exclusive - many systems can be seen as both. The former terminology is just more common in animation/gaming contexts, while the latter is from structural engineering.
I actually don’t call Kangaroo a particle spring system though. Although it has springs and particles, it has many other goals which are not based on springs.
The term ‘particle spring system’ is often used to refer to game/animation engines which simulate soft bodies simply by combining springs (for example modelling the bending of a rod by adding another spring between each particle and its neighbour’s neighbour). This can be good enough for games, but does not give mechanically accurate behaviour.
Kangaroo instead models bending with a 3 point approach derived from continuum mechanics which can give accurate deformations, and there are many other goals in Kangaroo which are not spring based and act on larger sets of particles.