Hello everyone,

I am trying to simulate the process of a tip approaching, contacting and retracting from a sample from a lateral direction. I use a non-linear static study of SolidWorks Premium. The tip is attached to one end of a triangular cantilever, the other end of which is fixed by fixed geometry.

The fixture of the sample is defined by advanced reference geometry to limit the translations in X and Y direction and the rotations in three directions. A prescribed displacement of 500nm is assigned to the sample in the Z direction.

The simulation failed may be due to: lack of fixtures/wrong material properties or wrong load increment (shown in the picture).

And I received the warning “ PCGLSS0087: Negativeor zero pivot 9.736656e-14 at row 9433. The solver has numerical difficulties. Automatic Reset:” in the soling window.

I am really confused about why this model does not work. Any suggestions or ideas are appreciated!!!!!!!!

Thank you so much!