A penalty function based method for dealing with overlap constraints in integrated layout and topology optimization design of multi-component systems

There are an amount of overlap constraints in the integrated layout and topology optimization design of a multi-component system containing tens of components. The integrated layout and topology optimization design of multi-component systems containing varieties of components are discussed in this paper. The finite-circle method (FCM) based penalty function is applied to deal with the overlap constraints among different components. A combined penalty function consisting of compliance and overlap constraints functions is chosen as the new objective. The gradient based optimization algorithm is implemented to maximize the stiffness of the system involving hundreds of overlap constraints, a total of tens of different components. Clear configurations of structure and non-overlapping positions of components are obtained in the simultaneous integrated layout and topology optimization deign. The optimized designs have shown the validity and efficiency of the proposed penalty function in dealing with overlap constraints in the integrated layout and topology optimization design of multi-component systems.