ICNPAA 2010: Mathematical Problems in
Engineering, Aerospace and Sciences

The action of loads suddenly applied to a body is not propagated instantaneously but is transmitted from one particle to another in a wave-like manner. In this paper, we study the impact loading of semi-infinite prismatic bars using a numerical algorithm based on the finite element method (FEM) and finite-differences method (FDM). A detailed analysis of the calculus errors is made and a theorem concerning the approximations is proved. The numerical example confirms the efficiency of the proposed method.