Coordinated deformation control technologies for the high sidewall—bottom transfixion zone of large underground hydro-powerhouses

It is imperative to understand the spatial and temporal coordination deformation mechanism and develop targeted deformation control technologies for high sidewall—bottom transfixion(HSBT)zones to guarantee the stability of rock surrounding underground hydro-powerhouses under complex geological conditions.In this study,the spatial and temporal coordinated deformation control of HSBT zones was addressed from the aspects of the deformation mechanism,failure characteristics,and control requirements,and some coordinated deformation control technologies were proposed.On this basis,a case study was conducted on the deformation control of the HSBT zone of the underground powerhouse at the Wudongde hydropower station,China.The results showed that the relationship between excavation and support,and the mismatch of deformation and support of the surrounding rock mass in the HSBT zone of underground caverns with a large span and high in-situ stress can be appropriately handled.The solution requires proper excavation and construction procedures,fine blasting control,composite and timely support,and real-time monitoring and dynamic feedback.The technologies proposed in this study will ensure the safe,high-quality,and orderly construction of the Baihetan and Wudongde underground caverns,and can be applied to other similar projects.

Deformation coordination analysis of CC-RCC combined dam structures under dynamic loads

A combined dam structure using different concrete materials offers many practical benefits.There are several real-world cases where largevolume heterogeneous concrete materials have been used together.From the engineering design standpoint,it is crucial to understand the deformation coordination characteristics and mechanical properties of large-volume heterogeneous concrete,which affect dam safety and stability.In this study,a large dam facility was selected for a case study,and various design schemes of the combined dam structure were developed by changing the configurations of material zoning and material types for a given dam shape.Elastoplastic analysis of the damfoundation-reservoir system for six schemes was carried out under dynamic conditions,in which the concrete damaged plasticity(CDP)model,the Lagrangian finite element formulation,and a surface-to-surface contact model were utilized.To evaluate the mechanical properties of zoning interfaces and coordination characteristics,the vertical distribution of the first principal stress at the longitudinal joint was used as the critical index of deformation coordination control,and the overall deformation and damage characteristics of the dam were also investigated.Through a comparative study of the design schemes,an optimal scheme of the combined dam structure was identified:large-volume roller-compacted concrete(RCC)is recommended for the dam body upstream of the longitudinal joint,and high-volume fly ash conventional concrete(CC)for the dam body downstream of the longitudinal joint.This study provides engineers with a reference basis for combined dam structure design.

Coordinated grain boundary deformation governed nanograin annihilation in shear cycling

Grain growth and shrinkage are essential to the thermal and mechanical stability of nanocrystalline metals,which are assumed to be governed by the coordinated deformation between neighboring grain boundaries(GBs)in the nanosized grains.However,the dynamics of such coordination has rarely been reported,especially in experiments.In this work,we systematically investigate the atomistic mechanism of coordinated GB deformation during grain shrinkage in an Au nanocrystal film through combined stateof-the-art in situ shear testing and atomistic simulations.We demonstrate that an embedded nanograin experiences shrinkage and eventually annihilation during a typical shear loading cycle.The continuous grain shrinkage is accommodated by the coordinated evolution of the surrounding GB network via dislocation-mediated migration,while the final grain annihilation proceeds through the sequential dislocation-annihilation-induced grain rotation and merging of opposite GBs.Both experiments and simulations show that stress distribution and GB structure play important roles in the coordinated deformation of different GBs and control the grain shrinkage/annihilation under shear loading.Our findings establish a mechanistic relation between coordinated GB deformation and grain shrinkage,which reveals a general deformation phenomenon in nanocrystalline metals and enriches our understanding on the atomistic origin of structural stability in nanocrystalline metals under mechanical loading.

Contact dynamics of elasto-plastic thin beams simulated via absolute nodal coordinate formulation

Under the frame of multibody dynamics, the contact dynamics of elasto-plastic spatial thin beams is numerically studied by using the spatial thin beam elements of absolute nodal coordinate formulation（ANCF）. The internal force of the elasto-plastic spatial thin beam element is derived under the assumption that the plastic strain of the beam element depends only on its longitudinal deformation.A new body-fixed local coordinate system is introduced into the spatial thin beam element of ANCF for efficient contact detection in the contact dynamics simulation. The linear isotropic hardening constitutive law is used to describe the elasto-plastic deformation of beam material, and the classical return mapping algorithm is adopted to evaluate the plastic strains. A multi-zone contact approach of thin beams previously proposed by the authors is also introduced to detect the multiple contact zones of beams accurately, and the penalty method is used to compute the normal contact force of thin beams in contact. Four numerical examples are given to demonstrate the applicability and effectiveness of the proposed elasto-plastic spatial thin beam element of ANCF for flexible multibody system dynamics.

Advances and trends in plastic forming technologies for welded tubes

With the implementation of environmental protection, sustainable development and conservation-oriented policies, components and parts of thin-walled welded tubes have gained increasing application in the aircraft and automotive industries because of their advantages： easily achieving forming and manufacturing process at low cost and in a short time. The current research on welded tube plastic forming is mainly concentrated on tube internal high-pressure forming, tube bending forming, and tube spinning forming. The focuses are on the material properties and char- acterization of welded tubes, finite element modeling for welded tube forming, and inhomogeneous deformation behavior and the mechanism and rules of deformation coordination in welded tube plastic forming. This paper summarizes the research progress in welded tube plastic forming from these aspects. Finally, with a focus on the urgent demand of the aviation, aerospace and automotive industries for high-strength and light-weight tubes, this paper discusses the development trends and challenges in the theory and technology of welded tube plastic forming in the future. Among them, laser tailor-welded technology will find application in the manufacture of high-strength steel tubes. Tube-end forming technology, such as tube flaring and flanging technology, will expand its appli- cation in welded tubes. Therefore, future studies will focus on the FE modeling regarding how to consider effects of welding on residual stresses, welding distortions and microstructure, the inhomo- geneous deformation and coordination mechanism of the plastic forming process of tailor-welded tubes, and some end-forming processes of welded tubes, and more comprehensive research on the formin~ mechanism and limit of welded tubes.