Applied Mechanics and Materials Online: 2011-09-08

ISSN: 1662-7482, Vols. 94-96, pp 81-85

doi:10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMM.94-96.81
© 2011 Trans Tech Publications Ltd, Switzerland

Dynamic response and failure modes of concrete slab under blast load

Qiaoyan Li 1,a, Gaihua Yu1,band Xiaoyun Guo 1,2,c

1
Institute of Disaster Prevention, Yanjiao, Hebei, 065201, China;
2
Institute of Engineering Mechanics, China Earthquake Administration, Harbin, Heilongjiang,
150080, China
a b c
[email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

Keywords: blast load, concrete slab, scaled distance

Abstract. The impact of blast load is always taken into consideration in significant building and
protective construction. In order to study the mechanical behavior of the concrete slab under blast
load, the dynamic responses of a square concrete slab under surface explosion are simulated by the
nonlinear finite element program ANSYS/LS-DYNA. The JOHNSON_HOLMQUIST_CONCRETE
model is used for concrete material and the damage and strain rate effect are considered in this mode1.
The simplified exponential load is used as blast load. The Z-displacement,Mises effective stress and
damage state of concrete slab under different blast load of corresponding scaled distance are
investigated and discussed. It can be found from the results that the influence of blast pressure can be
neglected when scaled distance is around 2.0 and the damage of slab is beginning from the edge.

Introduction
In recent years, the international terrible activities of explosion become more and more frequent, it has
already resulted in important threat to the safety of international society and people life property. It is
necessary usually to consider the blast and impact load for the important building and the protection
structure. Therefore, studying on the dynamic response of engineering structure under blast and
impact load is an important topic in the engineering field. There are already many studies on the
constitutive relation of concrete and the dynamic response of structural members under blast and
impact load[1,2,3,4]. But because of the complexity of problem, the study on the dynamic response of
concrete slab under blast load is less considering the damage and strain rate effect of concrete material
at the same time currently. The analysis calculation of the dynamic response of concrete slab under
blast load is carried in this text using numerical simulation.

Blast Load
The dynamic responses of a square concrete slab under different blast load of corresponding scaled
distance are simulated by the nonlinear finite element program ANSYS/LS-DYNA. Supposing the
concrete slab as completely rigid material, the blast load curve is got such as Fig.1. From Fig.1, we
can see that the peak value of explosion pressure is quickly decreased along with the increasing of
scaled distance. The safe scaled distance of concrete slab can be got by analyzing the dynamic
responses of concrete slab under different blast load of corresponding scaled distance.

Numerical Simulation
Model introduction. The concrete square slab is completed clamped supported with the
size1.0m×1.0m×0.08m. The SOLID164 element is used and the model of mesh generation is shown
by Fig.2. The erosion is considered by the key words of Material Add Erosion and the failure of
concrete slab is controlled by the tensile stress.

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82 Advances in Structural Engineering

Fig.1 Blast pressure at different scaled distance Fig.2 The model of mesh generation

Material Parameters. For the sake of description the nonlinear deformation and the fracture
characteristics of concrete, considering the damage and strain rate effect of concrete at the same time
the JOHNSON_HOLMQUIST_CONCRETE material model is used at the calculation. The material
parameters are shown such as table 1. Among them the density of concrete is 2.44g/m3.

Table 1 Material parameters of concrete

Strength constant Pressure constant

A 0.79 Pcrush[GPa] 0.16

B 1.60 µcrush 0.001

N 0.61 Plock[GPa] 0.80

C 0.007 µlock 0.1

fc[GPa] 0.048 T[GPa] 0.004

SMAX 7.0

G[GPa] 14.86

Damage constant Other parameters

D1 0.04 K1[GPa] 85

D2 1.0 K2[GPa] -171

EFMIN 0.01 K3[GPa] 208

Result Analysis and Comparison

Displacement Analysis of Concrete Slab. The Z-displacement comparison of concrete slab under
the blast load of corresponding scaled distance of 0.5, 1.5 and 2.0 is shown by Fig.3.
 Applied Mechanics and Materials Vols. 94-96 83

Fig.3 The Z-displacement comparison of concrete slab under the

different blast load of corresponding scaled distance

From the Fig.3 we can see, the Z-displacement is very small and only about 1mm when the scaled
distance is 2.0. The whole slab is not almost vibrational. So the influence of blast pressure can be
neglected when the scaled distance is around 2.0. But needing attention, because the time the blast
load played is very short and the peak value of explosion pressure is very big, we can not only judge
the destruction degree by displacement but also by residual capacity after blast load. Then objective
evaluation to destruction degree of concrete slab is carried.
Mises Effective Stress Analysis of Concrete Slab. The concrete slab is not almost vibrational
when the scaled distance is 2.0. So maximum Mises effective stress is analyzed at the scaled distance
of 0.5 and 1.5. The effective stress nephogram is shown as Fig.4(a,b,c,d).

(d) The stress nephogram of maximum stress at the mid point at the scaled distance of 1.5 (the stress
of element 8725 is maximum)
Fig.4 The effective stress nephogram of special nodes at different scaled distance
84 Advances in Structural Engineering

From the stress nephogram we can see, the stress all appear firstly at the edge of the slab, then
extend gradually to the center. The maximum stress all appear at the edge of the slab. The stress of
every node on the slab increase from 0 to the peak value, then decrease rapidly and it is a process of
elastic recovery. The stress of the slab is very small during later period of the blast load because of the
dissipation of energy. The stress of the slab decrease constantly with the dissipation of blast energy.
Damage Analysis of Concrete Slab. The damage diagram at three different scaled distance is
shown by Fig.5(a,b,c).

Fig.5 The damage diagram of the surface of load and the back at the different scaled distance

From the Fig.5, we can see that the damage of the slab is decreasing gradually with the increasing
of the scaled distance. The big deformation of the concrete slab appears at the scaled distance of 0.5.
The concrete at the edge of the clamped plate is destroyed because of the tensile stress and the back of
the slab appears many cracks. The little deformation of the concrete slab appears at the scaled distance
of 1.5. The concrete at the edge of the clamped plate is also destroyed but the back of the slab has not
appeared crack. When the scaled distance is 2.0, the concrete at the edge of the clamped plate has not
destroyed and the deformation is little.
 Applied Mechanics and Materials Vols. 94-96 85

Conclusions
The dynamic responses of a square concrete slab under surface explosion are simulated by the
nonlinear finite element program ANSYS/LS-DYNA. The JOHNSON_HOLMQUIST_CONCRETE
model is used for concrete material and the damage and strain rate effect are considered in this mode1.
The simplified exponential load is used as blast load. The Z-displacement, Mises effective stress and
damage state of concrete slab under different blast load of corresponding scaled distance are
investigated and discussed. It can be found from the results that the influence of blast pressure can be
neglected when scaled distance is around 2.0 and the damage of slab is beginning from the edge.

Acknowledgements
It is a project supported by the Teacher Research Foundation of China Seismological Bureau
(20100107).

References
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[2] Crawford.J.E, Malver.L.J: ACI Structural Journal. Vol. 4(1997), p. 371
[3] Lu.Y, Xu.K: International Journal of Solids and Structures. Vol. 1(2004), p. 131
[4] Baylot.J.T, Bullock.B: Journal of Structural Engineering. Vol. 8(2005), p. 1186