To define new field output by combining results from several output database frames, you use the Create Field Output From Frames dialog box.

You can select from the following operations involving frames:

The Create Field Output From Frames dialog box initially contains no output. You select the output database frames to consider; all the results available for these frames can then be combined, or you can select individual field output variables to combine. If you choose to sum the values over the selected frames, ABAQUS/CAE will create new field output variables representing the linear combinations of the selected results. Alternatively, you can choose to have ABAQUS/CAE determine the minimum or maximum values of the selected results in the range of selected frames. ABAQUS does not perform consistency checks on the physical validity of frame operations; for example, the linear superposition of two frames containing the results from load cases with different boundary conditions is allowed even though the combined results may not be physically meaningful.

Operations on tensors are performed in the local coordinate system, if it is available; otherwise, the global system is used. ABAQUS/CAE assumes that the local coordinate systems are consistent for nonunary operations involving tensors.

Figure 24–8 shows an example of creating field output by combining the results from several load cases (see “Modeling load cases,” Section 21.7, for more information on load cases). A new “load case” is created by summing the results from the selected load cases; you can assign a name to the new load case, as shown in the figure.