Traveling Wave Effects on Nonlinear Seismic Behavior of Concrete Gravity Dams

Abstract eng:
In evaluating the earthquake performance of concrete dams, it is evident that the manner in which earthquake ground motions excite the dam-reservoir system is of major importance. In the current article, the effect of partial variation in input excitation on the nonlinear seismic response of concrete gravity dams is considered including the effect of dam-reservoir interaction. The foundation environment beneath the dam body is assumed to be rigid for simplicity and the compressible fluid domain is modeled using fluid elements. The damage mechanics approach is utilized to model the tensile weakness of mass concrete. The exciting ground motion is varied linearly along the base nodes of the dam body considering various propagation velocities. The Pine Flat dam is chosen as a case study. It is found that when the excitation of the system is non-uniform at the base nodes, the patters of the principle stress contours and also, crack profiles are different in comparison with the case under the uniform excitation. In addition, the maximum tensile stresses and the crest displacements are higher in the case when the excitation is non-uniform. It can be concluded that the effect of traveling wave can be significant in seismic safety evaluation of existing concrete dams.

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