• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.10 no.6
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• pp.775-791
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• 2016

The indirect tensile strengths (ITSs) of different cemented paste backfill mixes with different curing times were determined by considering crack initiation and fracture toughness concepts under different loading conditions of steel loading arcs with various contact angles, flat platens and the standard Brazilian test jaw. Because contact area of the ITS test discs developes rapidly and varies in accordance with the deformability, ITSs of curing materials were not found convenient to determine under the loading apparatus with indefinite contact angle. ITS values increasing with an increase in contact angle can be measured to be excessively high because of the high contact angles resulted from the deformable characteristics of the soft paste backfill materials. As a result of the change of deformation characteristics with the change of curing time, discs have different contact conditions causing an important disadvantage to reflect the strength change due to the curing reactions. In addition to the experimental study, finite element analyses were performed on several types of disc models under various loading conditions. As a result, a comparison between all loading conditions was made to determine the best ITSs of the cemented paste backfill materials. Both experimental and numerical analyses concluded that loading arcs with definite contact angles gives better results than those obtained with the other loading apparatus without a definite contact angle. Loading arcs with the contact angle of $15^{\circ}$ was found the most convenient loading apparatus for the typical cemented paste backfill materials, although it should be used carefully considering the failure cracks for a valid test.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.353-373
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• 2015

In this paper, the effects of different types of irregularity along the height on the seismic responses of moment resisting frames are investigated using nonlinear dynamic analysis. Furthermore, the applicability of consecutive modal pushover (CMP) procedure for computing the seismic demands of vertically irregular frames is studied and the advantages and limitations of the procedure are elaborated. For this purpose, a special moment resisting steel frame of 10-storey height was selected as reference regular frame for which the effect of higher modes is important. Forty vertically irregular frames with stiffness, strength, combined-stiffness-and-strength and mass irregularities are created by applying two modification factors (MF=2 and 4) in four different locations along the height of the reference frame. Seismic demands of irregular frames are computed by using the nonlinear response history analysis (NL-RHA) and CMP procedure. Modal pushover analysis (MPA) method is also carried out for the sake of comparison. The effect of different types of irregularity along the height on the seismic demands of vertically irregular frames is investigated by studying the results obtained from the NL-RHA. To demonstrate the accuracy of the enhanced pushover analysis methods, the results derived from the CMP and MPA are compared with those obtained by benchmark solution, i.e., NL-RHA. The results show that the CMP and MPA methods can accurately compute the seismic demands of vertically irregular buildings. The methods may be, however, less accurate especially in estimating plastic hinge rotations for weak or weak-and-soft top and middle storeys of vertically irregular frames.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.69 no.3
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• pp.257-268
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• 2019

Infills are as important members in structural design as beams, columns and braces. They have significant effect on structural behavior. Because of lots of variables in infills like material non-linear behavior, the interaction between frames and infill, etc., the infills performance during an earthquake is complicated, so have led designers do not consider the effect of infills in designing the structure. However, the experimental studies revealed that the infills have the remarkable effect on structure behavior. As if these effects ignored, it might occur soft-story phenomena, torsion or short-column effects on the structures. One simple and appropriate method for considering the infills effects in analyzing, is replacing the infills with diagonal compression strut with the same performance of real infill, instead of designing the whole infill. Because of too many uncertainties, codes and researchers gave many expressions that were not as the same as the others. The major intent of this paper is calculation the width of this diagonal strut, which has the most characteristics of infill. This paper by comprehensive on different parameters like the modulus of young or moment of inertia of columns presents a new formula for achieving the equivalent strut width. In fact, this new formula is extracted from about 60 FEM analyses models. It can be said that this formula is very efficient and accurate in estimating the equivalent strut width, considering the large number of effective parameters relative to similar relationships provided by other researchers. In most cases, the results are so close to the values obtained by the FEM. In this formula, the effect of out of plane buckling is neglected and this formula is used just in steel structures. Also, the thickness of infill panel, and the lateral force applied to frame are constant. In addition, this new formula is just for modeling the lateral stiffness. Obtaining the nearest response in analyzing is important to the designers, so this new formula can help them to reach more accurate response among a lot of experimental equations proposed by researchers.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.10
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• pp.3745-3765
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• 2022

The concrete structures related to nuclear safety are threatened by accidental impact loadings, mainly including the low-velocity drop-weight impact (e.g., spent fuel cask and assembly, etc. with the velocity less than 20 m/s) and high-speed projectile impact (e.g., steel pipe, valve, turbine bucket, etc. with the velocity higher than 20 m/s), while the existing studies are still limited in the impact resistant design of nuclear power plant (NPP), especially the primary RC slab. This paper aims to propose the numerical simulation and theoretical approaches to assist the impact-resistant design of RC slab in NPP. Firstly, the continuous surface cap (CSC) model parameters for concrete with the compressive strength of 20-70 MPa are fully calibrated and verified, and the refined numerical simulation approach is proposed. Secondly, the two-degree freedom (TDOF) model with considering the mutual effect of flexural and shear resistance of RC slab are developed. Furthermore, based on the low-velocity drop hammer tests and high-speed soft/hard projectile impact tests on RC slabs, the adopted numerical simulation and TDOF model approaches are fully validated by the flexural and punching shear damage, deflection, and impact force time-histories of RC slabs. Finally, as for the two low-velocity impact scenarios, the design procedure of RC slab based on TDOF model is validated and recommended. Meanwhile, as for the four actual high-speed impact scenarios, the impact-resistant design specification in Chinese code NB/T 20012-2019 is evaluated, the over conservation of which is found, and the proposed numerical approach is recommended. The present work could beneficially guide the impact-resistant design and safety assessment of NPPs against the accidental impact loadings.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.41 no.5
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• pp.761-773
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• 2021

This study presents a 3D non-linear finite element (FE) assessment of dynamic soil-structure interaction (SSI). The numerical investigation has been performed on the time domain through a Finite Element (FE) system, while considering the nonlinear behavior of soil and the multi-directional nature of genuine seismic events. Later, the FE outcomes are analyzed to the recorded in-situ free-field and structural movements, emphasizing the numerical model's great result in duplicating the observed response. In this work, the soil response is simulated using an isotropic hardening elastic-plastic hysteretic model utilizing HSsmall. It is feasible to define the non-linear cycle response from small to large strain amplitudes through this model as well as for the shift in beginning stiffness with depth that happens during cyclic loading. One of the most difficult and unexpected tasks in resolving soil-structure interaction concerns is picking an appropriate ground motion predicted across an earthquake or assessing the geometrical abnormalities in the soil waves. Furthermore, an artificial neural network (ANN) has been utilized to properly forecast the non-linear behavior of soil and its multi-directional character, which demonstrated the accuracy of the ANN based on the RMSE and R² values. The total result of this research demonstrates that complicated dynamic soil-structure interaction processes may be addressed directly by passing the significant simplifications of well-established substructure techniques.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.22 no.9
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• pp.15-22
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• 2006

Single segmented mooring lines were tested in a geotechnical centrifuge for the purpose of calibrating the analytical solution developed for the analysis and design of various mooring lines associated with underwater drag/permanent anchors. The model mooring lines included steel ball chains and wire cables placed at various depths within the soft clayey seafloor soil. The mooring lines were loaded to preset tensions at the water surface under an elevated acceleration inside the centrifuge to simulate the field stress conditions experienced by the prototype mooring lines. This paper describes the calibration of two factors that are used as part of the input parameters in the analytical solution of mooring lines and considers the effect of chasing wires that were used in the experiment to determine the locations of the mooring lines.

• Ocean Systems Engineering
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• v.12 no.1
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• pp.87-142
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• 2022

An analysis for the computation of Fatigue Damage Index (FDI) under the effects of the various combination of the ocean loads like random waves, current, platform motion and VIV (Vortex Induced Vibration) for a certain design water depth is a critically important part of the analysis and design of the marine riser platform integrated system. Herein, a 'Computer Simulation Model (CSM)' is developed to combine the advantages of the frequency domain and time domain. A case study considering a steel catenary riser operating in 1000 m water depth has been conducted with semi-submersible. The riser is subjected to extreme environmental conditions and static and dynamic response analyses are performed and the Response Amplitude Operators (RAOs) of the offshore platform are computed with the frequency domain solution. Later the frequency domain results are integrated with time domain analysis system for the dynamic analysis in time domain. After that an extensive post processing is done to compute the FDI of the marine riser. In the present paper importance is given to the nature of the current profile and the VIV. At the end we have reported the detail results of the FDI comparison with VIV and without VIV under the linear current velocity and the FDI comparison with linear and power law current velocity with and without VIV. We have also reported the design recommendations for the marine riser in the regions where the higher fatigue damage is observed and the proposed CSM is implemented in industrially used standard soft solution systems (i.e., OrcaFlex^*TM and Ansys AQWA^**TM), Ms-Excel^***TM, and C++ programming language using its object oriented features.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.45 no.2
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• pp.205-218
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• 2022

Proper calculation of splitting tensile strength (STS) of concrete has been a crucial task, due to the wide use of concrete in the construction sector. Following many recent studies that have proposed various predictive models for this aim, this study suggests and tests the functionality of three hybrid models in predicting the STS from the characteristics of the mixture components including cement compressive strength, cement tensile strength, curing age, the maximum size of the crushed stone, stone powder content, sand fine modulus, water to binder ratio, and the ratio of sand. A multi-layer perceptron (MLP) neural network incorporates invasive weed optimization (IWO), cuttlefish optimization algorithm (CFOA), and electrostatic discharge algorithm (ESDA) which are among the newest optimization techniques. A dataset from the earlier literature is used for exploring and extrapolating the STS behavior. The results acquired from several accuracy criteria demonstrated a nice learning capability for all three hybrid models viz. IWO-MLP, CFOA-MLP, and ESDA-MLP. Also in the prediction phase, the prediction products were in a promising agreement (above 88%) with experimental results. However, a comparative look revealed the ESDA-MLP as the most accurate predictor. Considering mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) index, the error of ESDA-MLP was 9.05%, while the corresponding value for IWO-MLP and CFOA-MLP was 9.17 and 13.97%, respectively. Since the combination of MLP and ESDA can be an effective tool for optimizing the concrete mixture toward a desirable STS, the last part of this study is dedicated to extracting a predictive formula from this model.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.49 no.2
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• pp.161-180
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• 2023

In the previous research, the axial compressive capacity models for the glass fiber-reinforced polymer (GFRP)-reinforced circular concrete compression elements restrained with GFRP helix were put forward based on small and noisy datasets by considering a limited number of parameters portraying less accuracy. Consequently, it is important to recommend an accurate model based on a refined and large testing dataset that considers various parameters of such components. The core objective and novelty of the current research is to suggest a deep learning model for the axial compressive capacity of GFRP-reinforced circular concrete columns restrained with a GFRP helix utilizing various parameters of a large experimental dataset to give the maximum precision of the estimates. To achieve this aim, a test dataset of 61 GFRP-reinforced circular concrete columns restrained with a GFRP helix has been created from prior studies. An assessment of 15 diverse theoretical models is carried out utilizing different statistical coefficients over the created dataset. A novel model utilizing the group method of data handling (GMDH) has been put forward. The recommended model depicted good effectiveness over the created dataset by assuming the axial involvement of GFRP main bars and the confining effectiveness of transverse GFRP helix and depicted the maximum precision with MAE = 195.67, RMSE = 255.41, and R2 = 0.94 as associated with the previously recommended equations. The GMDH model also depicted good effectiveness for the normal distribution of estimates with only a 2.5% discrepancy from unity. The recommended model can accurately calculate the axial compressive capacity of FRP-reinforced concrete compression elements that can be considered for further analysis and design of such components in the field of structural engineering.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.40 no.3
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• pp.19-31
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• 2024

In Korea, driven piles are generally penetrated up to weathered rock or harder strata. Friction piles have been used to some extent in the southwest coastal area with deep soils; however, friction piles are not extensively due to uncertainties about construction quality. The embedded pile construction method is primarily used due to noise and vibration complaints. However, in Southeast Asian countries (e.g., Cambodia, Myanmar, and Vietnam), where soft sediments are deep, the driven pile method is commonly used due to its economic advantages. Construction companies are increasingly entering overseas construction markets, e.g., Southeast Asia; thus, it is necessary to understand the behavior of driven friction piles in the soil and improve on-site engineering management to gain market competitiveness in these countries. In this study, the bearing capacity of friction piles driven into clayey coastal soils in Vietnam with time-dependent characteristics was evaluated based on the dynamic and static pile load tests. Based on the results, a modified Danish formula is proposed for on-site quality management.