Impact response of RC rock-shed girder with sand cushion under falling load

In order to establish a proper finite element model of prototype RC girder with sand element for impact response analysis, dynamic response analysis of RC girders with sand cushion subjected to impact force due to weight falling from the height of H = 2.5, 5, 7.5 and 10 m was performed to improve the state of the art of protective design for real scale rock-sheds by using LS-DYNA code. An applicability of proposed model was discussed comparing with experimental results (e.g. impact force, reaction force and displacement waves). From this study, dynamic characteristics of impact response can be better simulated by using the proposed model. As a result, when the sand cushion was set up, the impact force, reaction force, mid-span displacement waves, distribution of reaction force–displacement loops, and crack patterns obtained from the numerical analysis are in good agreement with those from the experimental results.

Research highlights▶ An applicability of FE model of RC girders with sand cushion has been investigated. ▶ Experimental and numerical results of Impact force, reaction force and displacement have been performed. ▶ Cracks obtained from numerical models are in good agreement with the experimental ones. ▶ Reaction force–displacement loops agree well between numerical and experimental results. ▶ The configuration of the hysteretic loop at failure of RC girders can be approximated by a parallelogram.