3D Simulation of Packing of Heterogeneous Ellipsoidal Particles using Discrete Element Method

Elham Kheradmand, Serge Prudhomme, Marc Laforest, Mohamed Chekired, Varvara Roubtsova

In the proceedings of: GeoSt. John's 2019: 72nd Canadian Geotechnical Conference

Session: Numerical Modeling

ABSTRACT: Soil liquefaction, the phenomenon by which water-saturated soil temporarily loses strength due to dynamical loadings such as in earthquakes, can have dramatic consequences, e.g. collapse of entire buildings or destruction of dams and retaining structures. This paper deals with the modeling and simulation of dense packing processes for families of ellipsoidal particles of high aspect ratio and high volume ratio. The objective is to construct grain assemblies suitable to the numerical simulation of liquefaction Current simulations of these phenomena by the Discrete Element method are usually performed in terms of spherical particles. However, such a simple model for the description of the particles usually fails to provide accurate predictions of the behavior of actual grains of sand, one of the reasons being that contact forces and moments are incorrectly evaluated. The packing process consists in randomly dropping ellipsoids in a container and in applying unidirectional vibrations to the container to achieve dense packing. The process is repeated until a desired height is achieved and particles rest in a stable position. Interactions between particles are simulated in this work using the Discrete Element Method. Numerical examples for various distributions of aspect ratios and volume ratios will be presented in order to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed approach.

RÉSUMÉ: n et la simulation de procédés pour des familles de particules ellipsoïdales à rapport de forme et rapport volumique élevés. Le principal objectif est de construire des assemblages de grains qui soient appropriés à la simulation du phénomène de liquéfaction des sols. Ce phénomène, par lequel un sol , de barrages ou de structures de soutènement. s éléments discrets sont souvent basées sur particules sphériques. Cependant, ce simple modèle pour la raisons étant que les forces et moments de contact entre particules sont incorrectement évalués. Le procédé unidirectionnelles au contenant pour obthauteur désirée et que toutes les particules aient atteintes une position stable. Les interactions entre particules sont simulées ici par la méthode des éléments discrets. Des exemples numériques pour différentes distributions de rapports

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