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Subject: Stiff Problems and small step sizes
Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2008 20:57:01 +0000 (UTC)
Organization: Penn State University
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Hello

I'm analyzing a cargo dynamics problem where a box is tied down by chains on to a platform. I am trying to analyze the movement of the box in the event of a crash. The chains I'm using the tiedowns are extremely stiff and strong. Thus there are large forces imparted on to the box to arrest its movement. 

The model consists of a system of 1st order ODEs for a 6DOF problem. I use ode15s to solve this stiff problem. 

To simulate a crash, I have both the box and platform moving at the same initial velocity and then the platform suddenly stops at some time as if it hit a wall. The box would keep going if it wasn't for the tiedowns. When I try to run the simulation in Matlab, I get this error message before it finishes:

" Warning: Failure at t=6.500000e-03.  Unable to meet integration tolerances without reducing the step size below the smallest value allowed (1.387779e-17) at time t."

Any suggestions as to what I can do about this?

Another way of simulating this crash would be to give only the platform an initial velocity or an initial "kick". The error doesn't come up in this case for some reason. However, I would prefer to do it the former way where both are moving together at the same speed and then only the platform comes to a sudden stop.