Volume 36, N. 2

May-August 2013

An Efficient Model for Numerical Simulation of the Mechanical Behavior of Soils. Part 2: Applications

Article

Volume 36, N. 2, May-August 2013 | DOWNLOAD PDF (4 downloads)

Abstract

A numerical model to simulate the mechanical behavior of soils was introduced in Part 1 of this paper (also published in this issue). Detailed information about the analytical model were presented, where the critical state theory for soil mechanics was considered in the context of the elastoplastic formulation. Moreover, an efficient numerical formulation to deal with nonlinear applications was also presented, featuring important characteristics such as reduced integration techniques, explicit integration of the constitutive equation and a corotational formulation for the kinematical description of the continuum. In this second part of the present work, the numerical model proposed in the previous paper is applied to some classical examples of soil mechanics to demonstrate the applicability of the present formulation. Effects of a geometrically nonlinear approach over the numerical predictions are investigated and comparisons are performed taking into account results obtained by using a geometrically linear model. In addition, some comparisons are also carried out considering evaluations performed with different constitutive formulations in order to observe the mechanical behavior of the soil mass under different constitutive assumptions.

Keywords: critical state soil mechanics (CSSM), elastoplasticity, finite element method (FEM), One-point quadrature,


Submitted on March 29, 2011.
Final Acceptance on July 30, 2013.
Discussion open until December 31, 2013.
DOI: 10.28927/SR.362171