Seismic design or retrofit of buildings with metallic structural fuses by the damage-reduction spectrum

Recently, the structural fuse has become an important issue in the field of earthquake engineering. Due to the trilinearity of the pushover curve of buildings with metallic structural fuses, the mechanism of the structural fuse is investigated through the ductility equation of a single-degree-of-freedom system, and the corresponding damage-reduction spectrum is proposed to design and retrofit buildings. Furthermore, the controlling parameters, the stiffness ratio between the main frame and structural fuse and the ductility factor of the main frame, are parametrically studied, and it is shown that the structural fuse concept can be achieved by specific combinations of the controlling parameters based on the proposed damage-reduction spectrum. Finally, a design example and a retrofit example, variations of real engineering projects after the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed design procedures using buckling restrained braces as the structural fuses.

Shear behavior of two-order morphology in rock joints

Two-order morphology of rock joints named as waviness and unevenness can be separated by morphology classification method,which plays a decisive role in the evolution of shear stress during the shear test.The joint morphology is obtained by using 3D printing and 3D laser scanning techniques and the joint model samples in two-order morphology are produced by cement mortar.Then,shear tests are performed under different normal loads.Results shows that the waviness is dominant in the total morphology during the shear test,and the shear contribution of unevenness mainly occurs in the climbing phase of shearing process.Comparing the failure modes of two-order morphology,waviness mainly embodies shear dilation characteristics and unevenness mainly shows shear wear characteristics.Based on this,a quantitative parameter is proposed to represent the ratio of the peak shear strength of the two-order morphology to that of total morphology.The functional relationship between the peak shear strength of total and two-order morphologies is determined,providing a theoretical method for further in-depth study on the shear strength of the interaction with two-order morphology of rock joints.

Multi-scaled simulation of latticed frames considering bending collapse of pipes

To consider the bending collapse of the pipes in the latticed frames, based on the multi-scale simulation, the collapsed parts of the pipe are meshed by the shell elements as micro-scaled models, and the other parts are meshed by beam elements macro-models. The incremental displacement constraint equations for the nodes on the section between the two models are established based on the plane section premise of classical beam theory. The method to introduce the constraint equations is derived based on the Updated Largrangian method. The location of the micro-model is predicted by the stress field of the beam element, and the length of the collapsed part is adjusted by the plastic energy in the micro model. Several examples are included to illustrate the efficiency and accuracy of this method.

A generic method for rock mass classification

Rock mass classification(RMC) is of critical importance in support design and applications to mining,tunneling and other underground excavations. Although a number of techniques are available, there exists an uncertainty in application to complex underground works. In the present work, a generic rock mass rating(GRMR) system is developed. The proposed GRMR system refers to as most commonly used techniques, and two rock load equations are suggested in terms of GRMR, which are based on the fact that whether all the rock parameters considered by the system have an influence or only few of them are influencing. The GRMR method has been validated with the data obtained from three underground coal mines in India. Then, a semi-empirical model is developed for the GRMR method using artificial neural network(ANN), and it is validated by a comparative analysis of ANN model results with that by analytical GRMR method.

Impact of the Rainfall Intensity and Seepage on Slope Stability in Loess Plateau

In recent years,with the increase of traffic construction in mountainous areas in China,road slope traffic accidents have become more and more common.In addition,natural disasters such as landslides,collapses and subgrade settlements caused by rainfall,driving load,seasonal variation and groundwater distribution are frequent.In particular,rainfall is one of the most common factors leading to slope instability(landslide).Therefore,this paper proposes the seep module based on the application software Geo-studio,and analyzes the slope soil parameters and slope stability under five types of rainfall conditions:light rain(10 mm/d),moderate rain(25 mm/d),heavy rain(50 mm/d),rainstorm(100 mm/d),and torrential rain(250 mm/d).The critical safety factor under rainfall intensity is fitted with nonlinear curve by sine function.The results show that the fitting curve of rainfall intensity and safety factor on the upper slope is excellent.The residual points are evenly distributed in the belt area of±0.1,and the data basically conform to the nonlinear sine model,indicating that the curve plays an essential role in slope health diagnosis.

Transverse Flux Induction Coil for Uniform Bar Heating Excluding Edge

This work particularly focuses on compensating Joule heat in under-heated areas occurred when thin steel bar is(<20 mm)heated by transverse flux induction heater(TFIH).The under-heated areas take place in range of 50~150 mm from the both edges,so Transverse Flux Induction Coil(TFIC)including a magnetic core is proposed and optimized to supplement this fault.The solutions on the electromagnetic field are obtained numerically by commercial code MAXWELL 3D software from ANSYS Corp.and then,verified experimentally by pilot-scale tests,in which the TFIH was manufactured with a nominal power of 100 kW at a fundamental frequency of 1 kHz.Ultimately,TFIC having geometrically the optimized magnetic core made the heating pattern U-shaped,so could supply a desirable temperature profile for the rolling process.