I am seeing some interesting behavior with the surface side specification option within a tie constraint between two surfaces (meshed with S4 elements within 3Dx platform). Relevant abaqus documentation here. When I specify both the supports as double sided, the majority of the nodes are missing intersection with their respective master surface. However when I select either top or bottom side (without changing the position tolerance or any other options), no nodes miss the master surface. Shouldn't the double sided surface end up with a larger tied region than specifying either top or bottom side? The reason I am interested is because I have a detail as shown in the image attached, where both sides of the master need to be tied to separate slave surfaces. 

Thanks, 

Dana

My problem is