Seismic stability of reinforced soil walls under bearing capacity failure by pseudo-dynamic method

In order to evaluate the seismic stability of reinforced soil walls against bearing capacity failure,the seismic safety factor of reinforced soil walls was determined by using pseudo-dynamic method,and calculated by considering different parameters,such as horizontal and vertical seismic acceleration coefficients,ratio of reinforcement length to wall height,back fill friction angle,foundation soil friction angle,soil reinforcement interface friction angle and surcharge.The parametric study shows that the seismic safety factor increases by 24-fold when the foundation soil friction angle varies from 25°to 45°,and increases by 2-fold when the soil reinforcement interface friction angle varies from 0 to 30°.That is to say,the bigger values the foundation soil and/or soil reinforcement interface friction angles have,the safer the reinforced soil walls become in the seismic design.The results were also compared with those obtained from pseudo-static method.It is found that there is a higher value of the safety factor by the present work.

Evaluation of survival stow position and stability analysis for heliostat under strong wind

Heliostats are sensitive to the wind load, thus as a key indicator, the study on the static and dynamic stability bearing capacity for heliostats is very important. In this work, a numerical wind tunnel was established to calculate the wind load coefficients in various survival stow positions. In order to explore the best survival stow position for the heliostat under the strong wind, eigenvalue buckling analysis method was introduced to predict the critical wind load theoretically. Considering the impact of the nonlinearity and initial geometrical imperfection, the nonlinear post-buckling behaviors of the heliostat were investigated by load-displacement curves in the full equilibrium process. Eventually, combining B-R criterion with equivalent displacement principle the dynamic critical wind speed and load amplitude coefficient were evaluated. The results show that the determination for the best survival stow position is too hasty just by the wind load coefficients. The geometric nonlinearity has a great effect on the stability bearing capacity of the heliostat, while the effects of the material nonlinearity and initial geometrical imperfection are relatively small. And the heliostat is insensitive to the initial geometrical imperfection. In addition, the heliostat has the highest safety factor for wind-resistant performance in the stow position of 90-90 which can be taken as the best survival stow position. In this case, the extreme survival wind speeds for the static and dynamic stability are 150 m/s and 36 m/s, respectively.

Effect of adding natural pozzolana on geotechnical properties of lime-stabilized clayey soil

Clayey soils in Syria cover a total area of more than 20,000 km2 of the country, most of which are located in the southwestern region. In many places of the country, the clayey soils caused severe damage to infrastructures. Extensive studies have been carried out on the stabilization of clayey soils using lime. Syria is rich in both lime and natural pozzolana. However, few works have been conducted to investigate the influence of adding natural pozzolana on the geotechnical properties of lime-treated clayey soils. The aim of this paper is to understand the effect of adding natural pozzolana on some geotechnical properties of lime-stabilized clayey soils. Natural pozzolana and lime are added to soil within the range of 0%–20% and 0%–8%, respectively. Consistency, compaction, California bearing ratio （CBR） and linear shrinkage properties are particularly investigated. The test results show that the investigated properties of lime-treated clayey soils can be considerably enhanced when the natural pozzolana is added as a stabilizing agent. Analysis results of scanning electron microscopy （SEM） and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy （EDX） show significant changes in the microstructure of the treated clayey soil. A better flocculation of clayey particles and further formation of cementing materials in the natural pozzolana-lime-treated clayey soil are clearly observed.

Correlation of Cooperatively Localized Rearrangement on the ＂Fluidized Domain＂ of Polymers to Their Nonexponentially Viscoelastic Behavior and Lifetime at Double Aging Processes II： Estimation of Long-term Mechanical Behavior and Lifetime of Polymeric Materials from Short-time Creep and Stress Relaxation Tests

Three kinds of polymeric materials are taken as example for the verification of linear ex-trapolation method from unified master lines with reduced universal equations on creep and stress relaxation tests. The theoretical values of long-term mechanical behavior and lifetime for a cured epoxide, polypropylene, poly（methyl-methacrylate）, and SBR rubber are directly evaluated with the universal equations on reduced creep compliance and reduced stress relax-ation modulus and are compared with their predicted values by the linear extrapolation from the unified master lines of creep and stress relaxation. The results show that the theoretical values of dimensional stability, bearing ability and lifetime are in an excellent agreement with the predicted values, it shows that the linear extrapolation method is more simple and reliable. The dependences of long-term mechanical behaviors and lifetime on the different aging times are discussed.

Performance behaviour of elliptical-bore journal bearings lubricated with solid granular particulates

Journal bearings operating in hot environments and at high temperatures experience accelerated degra- dation of lubricating oils. In such situations, dry granular particulates have emerged as potential media for providing lubrication in journal bearings in place of lubricating oils. Granular particulates do not degrade thermally, even at considerably high temperatures. This work explores the static and dynamic perfor- mance characteristics of elliptical-bore journal bearings lubricated with granular particulates. It is found that a bearing lubricated with a larger size （2 μm） particles offers better performance compared with that using smaller size （1μm） particles. Bore ellipticity reduces the load-carrying capacity and increases side leakage and the coefficient of friction; however, rotor stability is marginally improved at low eccentricity ratios （〈0.6）, followed by significant improvement at high eccentricity ratios （〉0.6）.

Flow-pipe-soil coupling mechanisms and predictions for submarine pipeline instability

The stability of a submarine pipeline on the seabed concerns the flow-pipe-soil coupling, with influential factors related to the ocean waves and/or currents, the pipeline and the surrounding soils. A flow-pipe-soil coupling system generally has various instability modes, including the vertical and lateral on-bottom instabilities, the tunnel-erosion of the underlying soil and the subsequent vortex-induced vibrations（VIVs） of free-spanning pipelines. This paper reviews the recent advances of the slip-line field solutions to the bearing capacity, the flow-pipe-soil coupling mechanism and the prediction for the lateral instability, the multi-physical coupling analysis of the tunnel-erosion, and the coupling mechanics between the VIVs and the local scour. It is revealed that the mechanism competition always exists among various instability modes, e.g., the competition between the lateral-instability and the tunnel-erosion. Finally, the prospects and scientific challenges for predicting the instability of a long-distance submarine pipeline are discussed in the context of the deep-water oil and gas exploitations.