Effects of connection types and elevated temperature on the impact behaviour of restrained beam in portal steel frame

Based on the background of structural protection and Disaster Reduction Engineering, the dynamic behaviour and failure mechanism of restrained beams in portal steel frames in localised fire are investigated via experimental measurement and numerical simulation techniques. Comprehensive parametric studies are carried out to discuss the influence of end connection types, temperature, impact velocity,impact mass and span-to-depth ratio(SDR) on the dynamic response of the beams. The characteristics of deformation, internal force and energy distribution about the restrained beams and its joints are investigated. A temperature dependent criterion for evaluating the frame joint performance is proposed to measure the degree of performance degradation and impact resistance of the joint. The dynamic displacement amplification factor in different temperature environments are proposed for the different beam end constraint types and SDRs. Results of the experimental and numerical analysis show that the welded connection(WC) of three typical joint types is the strongest, and the extended endplate connection(EEC) is the weakest in terms of the impact resistance performance. With regard to the failure mode of the joint, the failure positions of the WC and the welded-bolted connection are located in the inner web of the column. Meanwhile, the EEC is located in the connection position between the beam and the endplate. Three different internal force stages and two obvious critical temperature boundaries of the restrained beams emerge with the increase in temperature, and they have significant characteristics in terms of deformation trend, internal force transfer and energy distribution. During the impact, a phenomenon known as “compression arch action” develops into “catenary action” with the increase in deflection in the frame beam mechanism.

Experimental Study on Interference Effect of Three Risers Arranged in Tandem with Variable Spacing Ratios

Taking the three-riser group arranged in tandem as the research subject,an experimental study was carried out on the risers arranged in tandem.The purpose is to explore the sensitivity of the dynamic response of each riser to spacing ratio and reveal the physical mechanism of riser groups under the interference effect.The spacing ratios of the adj acent risers are 4.0,5.0,6.0,and 8.0.At the spacing between the risers of 4.0D,the strong feedback effect increases the cross-flow(CF) displacement amplitude of the upstream riser.The shielding effect is the key factor affecting the interference effect on the midstream and downstream risers.At low reduced velocities,the shielding area initially appears,the displacement amplitude of the midstream and downstream risers varies greatly,the vibration of the two risers is still dominated by the first-order mode,and the transition between adjacent vibration modes is restrained.The multi-frequency superposition phenomenon is very significant at high reduced velocities.The most sensitive interference spacing under the test conditions is obtained.Due to the separation of the incoming flow and the double shielding effect of the upstream and midstream risers,the regular vortex-induced vibration in the wake area of the downstream riser is broken,and the vibration in the two directions is weakened.In general,the interference effect is more significant for the CF vibration of the three-riser groups than the in-line(IL) vibration.

Theoretical analysis of a new segmented anchoring style in weakly cemented soft surrounding rock

According to the tensile failure of rock bolt in weakly cemented soft rock, this paper presents a new segmented anchoring style in order to weaken the cumulative effect of anchoring force associated with the large deformation. Firstly, a segmented mechanical model was established in which free and anchoring section of rock bolt were respectively arranged in different deformation zones. Then, stress and displacement in elastic non-anchoring zone, elastic anchoring zone, elastic sticking zone, softening sticking zone and broken zone were derived respectively based on neural theory and tri-linear strain softening constitutive model of soft rock. Results show that the anchoring effect can be characterized by a supporting parameter b. With its increase, the peak value of tangential stress gradually moves to the roadway wall, and the radial stress significantly increases, which means the decrease of equivalent plastic zone and improvement of confining effect provided by anchorage body. When b increases to 0.72, the equivalent plastic zone disappears, and stresses tend to be the elastic solutions. In addition, the anchoring effect on the displacement of surrounding rock can be quantified by a normalization factor δ.

Pore capillary pressure and saturation of methane hydrate bearing sediments

To better understand the relationship between the pore capillary pressure and hydrate saturation in sediments, a new method was proposed. First, the phase equilibria of methane hydrate in fine-grained silica sands were measured. As to the equilibrium data, the pore capillary pressure and saturation of methane hydrate were calculated. The results showed that the phase equilibria of methane hydrates in fine-grained silica sands changed due to the depressed activity of pore water caused by the surface group and negatively charged characteristic of silica particles as well as the capillary pressure in small pores together. The capillary pressure increased with the increase of methane hydrate saturation due to the decrease of the available pore space. However, the capillary-saturation relationship could not yet be described quantitatively because of the stochastic habit of hydrate growth.

Experimental Study on Vortex-Induced Vibration Coupling Wake Interference of Multi-Riser Groups with Sensitive Spacing

The“riser group−fluid between risers”is taken as the carrier,and the experiment on vortex-induced vibration of tandem riser groups coupling interference effect under sensitive spacing is performed.The least-square method is used to linearly fit the reduced velocity and main frequency,and the rule of Strouhal numbers is analyzed.Each mode is separated based on the mode decomposition theory,and the mode conversion mechanism is also explored.The concept of“interference efficiency”is introduced to study the dynamic characteristics and response evolutions of different riser groups.The results show that the wake shielding effect widely exists in tandem riser groups,and the interference effect of midstream and downstream risers on their upstream risers is significantly lower than that of upstream risers on midstream and downstream risers.The trajectories of midstream and downstream risers lag behind their upstream risers due to multiple shadowing effects,the vibration frequency range of downstream riser is widened and the dominant frequency is extremely unstable.Compared with the isolated riser,wake interference suppresses the vibration dis-placement of the midstream and downstream risers in the in-line direction,and enhances the displacement of upstream and midstream risers in the cross-flow direction.The interference effect of the fluid between risers at low velocities is stronger than that at higher velocities,and the cross-flow displacements of upstream risers are always in the interference enhancement region.It is urgent to pay attention to the cross-flow displacement of upstream and midstream risers in tandem riser groups considering the safety design.

P-T stability conditions of methane hydrate in sediment from South China Sea

For reasonable assessment and safe exploitation of marine gas hydrate resource, it is important to determine the stability conditions of gas hydrates in marine sediment. In this paper, the seafloor water sample and sediment sample （saturated with pore water） from Shenhu Area of South China Sea were used to synthesize methane hydrates, and the stability conditions of methane hydrates were investigated by multi-step heating dissociation method. Preliminary experimental results show that the dissociation temperature of methane hydrate both in seafloor water and marine sediment, under any given pressure, is depressed by approximately -1.4 K relative to the pure water system. This phenomenon indicates that hydrate stability in marine sediment is mainly affected by pore water ions.

An Experimental Study on Dynamics Features of Three Side-by-Side Flexible Risers Undergoing Vortex-Induced Vibrations in A Uniform Flow

A vortex-induced vibration(VIV)experiment on three side-by-side risers subjected to a uniform flow was carried out in a combined wave-current flume.The dynamic features of interference effect on three side-by-side risers were investigated by varying fluid velocity and inter-riser spacing.The distributions of dimensionless displacement,dominant frequency,and displacement trajectory of the model risers were measured using mode decomposition and wavelet transform techniques.The coupled interference of inter-riser fluid to adjacent risers at different spacings was disclosed by introducing the"interference ratio"concept.The results show that at spacings smaller than 6.0 D,the three model risers display appreciable deviations in their displacement responses in cross-flow or in-line direction,attributable to the strong proximity disturbance and wake interference between the risers.When the spacing is increased to 8.0 D,wake interference still makes great difference to the dynamic response of the risers in both directions.As reduced velocity increases,the three risers show higher agreement with an isolated riser in overall dominant vibration frequency in CF direction than that in IL direction at all spacings and the side risers,although symmetrically placed,do not vibrate symmetrically,as a result of the steady deflection of clearance flow within the riser group.Interference effect results in a remarkable unsteady mode competition within the risers;quantitation of the interference levels for the three risers at different spacings with interference ratio revealed that under low flow velocities and large spacing ratios,clearance flow constitutes a non-neglectable interferer for three side-by-side risers.

Experimental Investigation of Disturbing the Flow Field on the Vortex-Induced Vibration of Deepwater Riser Fitted with Gas Jetting Active Vibration Suppression Device

An experimental investigation on the disturbance effect of jet-type active vibration suppression device on vortexinduced vibration of deep-sea riser was carried out in the wave-flow combined flume.The vibration suppression device was designed in which the jet pipe was horizontally fixed to the front end of the riser.By varying three different excitation spacings and multi-stage outflow velocities,the influence law of the dominant frequency,dimensionless displacement and other dynamic response parameters was studied under different excitation spacings,and the mechanism and sensitive characteristics of the disturbance suppression were explored.The results indicate that the variation of excitation spacing makes gas curtain enter the strong disturbed flow region at different velocities and angles,and the coupling relationship between excitation spacing and reduced velocity is the key factor to enter the strong disturbed flow region to achieve the optimal disturbance suppression.In the strong disturbed flow region,the influence of gas curtain on the dominant frequency is obviously affected by the flow velocity,while the vibration displacement is stable at the same amplitude and is weakly affected by the flow velocity.Gas curtain can effectively disturb the formation of vortex shedding,destroy the strong nonlinear coupled vibration of the riser,and achieve better vibration suppression effect.In the weak disturbed flow region,the vortex length of the riser tail is prolonged,the strong nonlinear coupled vibration of the riser is gradually restored,and the vibration suppression effect of the device gradually decreases.

Experimental Investigation on Vortex-Induced Vibration of Deep-Sea Risers of Different Excitation Water Depths

The vortex-induced vibration test of the deep-sea riser was carried out with different excitation water depths in the wave-current combined water flume.By dimensionally changing the multi-stage water depth and hydrodynamic parameters such as outflow velocity at various water depths,the dynamic response parameters such as dominant frequency,dimensionless displacement and vibration trajectory evolution process of the riser under different excitation water depths were explored to reveal the sensitive characteristics of the dynamic response of vortexinduced vibration of the risers under different excitation water depths.The results show that different excitation water depths will change the additional mass of the riser and the fluid damping and other parameters,which will affect the spatial correlation and stability of the vortex shedding behind the riser.In the lock-in region,the distribution range of the characteristic frequency becomes narrow and centered on the lock-in frequency.The increase of the excitation water depth gradually advances the starting point of the lock-in region of the riser,and at the same time promotes the excitation of the higher-order vibration frequency of the riser structure.Within the dimensionless excitation water depth,the dominant frequency and dimensionless displacement are highly insensitive to the excitation water depth at high flow velocity.The change of the excitation water depth will interfere with the correlation of the non-linear coupling of the riser.The“8-shaped”gradually becomes irregular,and the vibration trajectories of the riser show“O-shape”,“X-shape”and“Crescent-shape”.

Comparative analysis of seismic response characteristics of pile-supported structure

In order to analyze the seismic response characteristics of pile-supported structure,a computational model considering pile-soil-structure interaction effect was established by finite element method.Then,numerical implementation was made in time domain.At the same time,a simplified approximation for seismic response analysis of pile-soil-structure system was briefly presented.Furthermore,comparative study was performed for an engineering example.Through comparative analysis,it is shown that the results obtained by the simplified method well agree with those achieved by the finite element method.These results show that spectrum characteristics and intensity of input earthquakes are two important factors that can notablely influence the seismic response characteristics of superstructure.When the input ground motion acceleration amplitude gradually increases from 1 to 4 m/s2,the acceleration of pier top will increase,but it will not be simply proportional to the increase of input acceleration amplitude.

Shear behaviours and roughness degeneration based on a quantified rock joint surface description

The asperity wear of rock joints significantly affects their shear behaviour.This study discusses the wear damage of the asperities on the joint surface,highlighting the roughness degradation characteristics during the shear process.The direct shear experiment of artificial specimens containing rock joints was conducted under different normal stresses based on three-dimensional scanning technology.These experimental results showed the contribution of joint wear to roughness degeneration,such as the height,zone,and volume of asperity degeneration.The wear coefficient of the rock joint was obtained based on the volume wear of asperities in the laboratory experiment.The functional relationship between the friction coefficient and wear coefficient is subsequently determined.To quantitatively analyse the wear damage of a joint surface,a calculation method for determining the wear depth of the rock joint after shearing was proposed based on wear theory.The relationship between the ultimate dilation and wear depth was analysed.A coefficient m,which can describe the damage degree of the joint surface,and a prediction method of joint surface roughness after shearing are established.Good agreement between analytical predictions and measured values demonstrates the capability of the developed model.Lastly,the sensitivity factors on the wear depth are explored.

Permeability evolution and gas flow in wet coal under non-equilibrium state:Considering both water swelling and process-based gas swelling

Accurate knowledge of gas flow within the reservoir and related controlling factors will be important for enhancing the production of coal bed methane.At present,most studies focused on the permeability evolution of dry coal under gas adsorption equilibrium,gas flow and gas diffusion within wet coal under the generally non-equilibrium state are often ignored in the process of gas recovery.In this study,an improved apparent permeability model is proposed which accommodates the water and gas adsorption,stress dependence,water film thickness and gas flow regimes.In the process of modeling,the water adsorption is only affected by water content while the gas adsorption is time and water content dependent;based on poroelastic mechanics,the effective fracture aperture and effective pore radius are derived;and then the variation in water film thickness for different pore types under the effect of water content,stress and adsorption swelling are modeled;the flow regimes are considered based on Beskok’s model.Further,after validation with experimental data,the proposed model was applied to numerical simulations to investigate the evolution of permeability-related factors under the effect of different water contents.The gas flow in wet coal under the non-equilibrium state is explicitly revealed.

Failure behavior around a circular opening in a rock mass with non-persistent joints:A parallel-bond stress corrosion approach

The stability of underground excavations is influenced by discontinuities interspaced in surrounding rock masses as well as the stress condition. In this work, a numerical study was undertaken on the failure behavior around a circular opening in a rock mass having non-persistent open joints using PFC software package. A parallel-bond stress corrosion(PSC) approach was incorporated to drive the failure of rock mass around the circular opening, such that the whole progressive failure process after excavation was reproduced. Based on the determined micro parameters for intact material and joint segments, the failure process around the circular opening agrees very well with that obtained through laboratory experiment. A subsequent parametric study was then carried out to look into the influence of lateral pressure coefficient, joint dip angle and joint persistency on the failure pattern and crack evolution of the rock mass around the circular opening. Three failure patterns identified are step path failure, planar failure and rotation failure depending on the lateral pressure coefficient. Moreover, the increment of joint dip angle and joint persistency aggravates the rock mass failure around the opening. This study offers guideline on stability estimation of underground excavations.

An improved apparent permeability model considering full pore pressure range,variable intrinsic permeability and slippage coefficient

Although the slippage effect has been extensively studied,most of the previous studies focused on the impact of the slippage effect on apparent permeability within a low pore pressure range,resulting in the inability of matching the evolution of permeability in the remaining pressure range.In this paper,a new apparent permeability model that reveals the evolution of permeability under the combined action of effective stress and slippage in the full pore pressure range was proposed.In this model,both intrinsic permeability and slippage coefficient are stress dependent.Three experimental tests with pore pressure lower than 2 MPa and a test with pore pressure at about 10 MPa using cores from the same origin under constant confining stress and constant effective stress are conducted.By comparing experimental data and another apparent permeability model,we proved the fidelity of our newly developed model.Furthermore,the contribution factor of the slippage effect Rslip is used to determine the low pore pressure limit with significant slippage effect.Our results show that both narrow initial pore size and high effective stress increase the critical pore pressure.Finally,the evolutions of the slippage coefficient and the intrinsic permeability under different boundary conditions were analyzed.

Connecting parameters optimization on unsymmetrical twin-tower structure linked by sky-bridge

Based on a simplified 3-DOF model of twin-tower structure linked by a sky-bridge,the frequency response functions,the displacement power spectral density(PSD)functions,and the time-averaged total vibration energy were derived,by assuming the white noise as the earthquake excitation.The effects of connecting parameters,such as linking stiffness ratio and linking damping ratio,on the structural vibration responses were then studied,and the optimal connecting parameters were obtained to minimize the vibration energy of either the independent monomer tower or the integral structure.The influences of sky-bridge elevation position on the optimal connecting parameters were also discussed.Finally,the distribution characteristics of the top displacement PSD and the structural responses,excited by El Centro,Taft and artificial waves,were compared in both frequency and time domain.It is found that the connecting parameters at either end of connection interactively affect the responses of the towers.The optimal connecting parameters can greatly improve the damping connections on their seismic reduction effectiveness,but are unable to reduce the seismic responses of the towers to the best extent simultaneously.It is also indicated that the optimal connecting parameters derived from the simplified 3-DOF model are applicable for two multi-story structures linked by a sky-bridge with dampers.The seismic reduction effectiveness obtained varies from 0.3 to 1.0 with different sky-bridge mass ratio.The displacement responses of the example structures are reduced by approximately 22% with sky-bridge connections.

Deformation field and crack analyses of concrete using digital image correlation method

The study on the deformation distribution and crack propagation of concrete under axial compression was conducted by the digital image correlation (DIC) method. The main parameter in this test is the water-cement (fT/C) ratio. The novel analysis process and numerical program for DIC method were established. The displacements and strains of coarse aggregate, and cement mortar and interface transition zone (ITZ) were obtained and verified by experimental results. It was found that the axial displacement distributed non-uniformly during the loading stage, and the axial displacements of ITZs and cement mortar were larger than that of coarse aggregates before the occurrence of macrocracks. The effect of W/C on the horizontal displacement was not obvious. Test results also showed that the transverse and shear deformation concentration areas (DCAs) were formed when stress reached 30%-40% of the peak stress. The transverse and shear DCAs crossed the cement mortar, and ITZs and coarse aggregates. However, the axial DCA mainly surrounded the coarse aggregate. Generally, the higher W/C was, the more size and number of DCAs were. The crack propagations of specimens varied with the variation of W/C. The micro-crack of concrete mainly initiated in the ITZs, irrespective of the W/C. The number and distribution range of cracks in concrete with high W/C were larger than those of cracks in specimen adopting low W/C. However, the value and width of eraeks in high W/C specimen were relatively small. The W/C had an obvious effect on the characteristics of concrete deterioration. Finally, the characteristics of crack was also evaluated by comparing the calculated results.

Safety evaluation of Dagangshan arch dam resisting strong earthquakes with a rate-dependency anisotropic damage model

This paper presents a model to simulate the safe behavior of Dagangshan arch dam with a rate-dependency anisotropic damage model. This model considers the damage of asymmetry and anisotropy under cyclic loading of tension and compression, and it is used in the compiled finite element code. The material parameters used in the model can be identified from uniaxial static and dynamic experiments. Thereafter, it is used for analyzing damage and failure patterns of the dam subjected to water pressure and strong earthquakes. The numerical results show that it is necessary to consider both asymmetry between tension and compression and anisotropy of damage. Severe damage regions of the dam reveal brittle and risky positions clearly. Meanwhile damage patterns show the failure trend and safety behaviors of the dam. These results match well with that of the experiments carried out in DUT. The proposed model may be used to predict the damage patterns and potential failure modes of concrete structures like the dam. And the aseismic performance of the dam can be figured out.

Advances in development of shear-flow testing apparatuses and methods for rock fractures:A review

Understanding the mechanical and hydraulic properties of fractured rocks and their coupled processes is of great significance for the exploration,design,construction,operation,and maintenance of many rock engineering projects such as hydropower development,oil and gas extraction,and underground waste disposal.With the rapid advancement of global and national strategies such as the“Paris Agreement”and the“Belt and Road Initiative”,more and more projects are developed in the complex geological environment with varying geological structures.Shear failure and rock instability are prone to occur in fractured rock masses under the coupled effects of high stress,high pore pressure,and engineering disturbance,which are main sources for engineering disasters such as roof collapse and caving,water and mud inrushes,and induced earthquakes.To solve these problems,extensive research on the coupled shear-flow behavior of fractures has been conducted.However,due to the complex mechanical,hydraulic and geometrical characteristics of single fractures and fracture networks,a large number of outstanding issues related to the impact of the coupled processes on the engineering characteristics of rock masses are still unsolved.The relevant experimental apparatuses and methods remain to be further developed.Therefore,in this review,we analyze and summarize the existing shear-flow experimental apparatuses,classify apparatus configurations,specimen shapes,and testing principles,and compare their advantages and disadvantages.We also summarize the main scientific findings obtained from various experimental apparatuses,aiming to provide a reference for developing new shear-flow experimental apparatuses and conducting related scientific research in the future.

Experimental and numerical investigations of the compressive behavior of carbon fiber-reinforced polymer-strengthened tubular steel T-joints

A method for strengthening damaged tubular steel T-joints under axial compression by wrapping them with carbon fiber-reinforced polymer(CFRP)sheets was proposed and evaluated.The influence of the CFRP strengthening on the failure mode and load capacity of T-joints with different degrees of damage was investigated using experiments and finite element analyses.Five T-joints were physically tested:one bare joint to obtain the peak load and corresponding displacement(D1m),two reinforced joints to provide a reference,and two pre-damaged then retrofitted joints to serve as the primary research objects.The ratio of the pre-loaded specimen chord displacement to the value of D1m was considered to be the degree of damage of the two retrofitted joints,and was set to 0.80 and 1.20.The results demonstrate that the maximum capacity of the retrofitted specimen was increased by 0.83%–15.06%over the corresponding unreinforced specimens.However,the capacity of the retrofitted specimen was 2.51%–22.77%lesser compared with that of the directly reinforced specimens.Next,111 numerical analysis models(0.63≤b≤0.76,9.70≤g≤16.92)were established to parametrically evaluate the effects of different geometric and strengthening parameters on the load capacity of strengthened tubular T-joints under different degrees of damage.The numerical analysis results revealed that the development of equivalent plastic strain at the selected measuring points was moderated by strengthening with CFRP wrapping,and indicated the optimal CFRP strengthening thickness and wrapping orientation according to tubular T-joint parameters.Finally,reasonable equations for calculating the load capacity of CFRP-strengthened joints were proposed and demonstrated to provide accurate results.The findings of this study can be used to inform improved CFRP strengthening of damaged tubular steel structures.