• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2009.09a
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• pp.225-232
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• 2009

Infiltration of rainfall causes railway slopes to be unstable and may result in failure. Basic relationship between the rainfall and stability of railway embankment is defined to analyze its stability by rainfall. An experimental study for defining of infiltration rate of rainfall into slope is conducted in the lab. The results of Rainfall infiltration show that rainfall infiltration is not equal to infiltration as like reservoir because rate of rainfall infiltration is controlled by slope angle. Based on these results, boundary condition of rainfall is altered and various numerical analysis are performed. The variation of shear strength, the degree of saturation and pore-water pressure for railway slope during rainfall can be predicted and the safety factor of railway slope can be expressed as the function of rainfall amount, namely rainfall index. And suggested rainfall index is compared with the rail transport operation control which is used in KORAIL. It is judged that this rainfall index can be a good tool for the rail-transport operation control.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.881-892
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• 2017

Design and management of concrete slabs in concrete-faced rock-fill dams are crucial issues for stability and overall dam safety since cracks in the concrete face induced by stress, shrinkage, and deterioration can cause severe leakage from the reservoir into the dam. Especially, the increase of dam height to a certain level to enhance the storage capacity and to improve hydraulic stability can lead to undesirable deformation behavior and stress distribution in the existing dam body and in the concrete slabs. In such conditions, simulation of a concrete slab with a numerical method should involve the use of an interface element because the behavior of the concrete slab does not follow the behavior of the dam body when the dam body settles due to the increase of dam height. However, the interfacial properties between the dam body and the concrete slab have yet to be clearly defined. In this study, construction sequence of a 125 m high CFRD in South Korea is simulated with commercial FDM software. The proper interfacial properties of the concrete slab are estimated based on a comparison to monitored vertical displacement history obtained from the concrete slab. Possibility of shear strength failure under the critical condition is investigated based on the simplified model. Results present the significance of the interfacial properties of the concrete slab.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.51 no.4
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• pp.663-683
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• 2014

In order to study the dynamic failure mechanism and aseismic measure for high concrete gravity dam under earthquake, the comparative models experiment on the shaking table was conducted to investigate the dynamic damage response of concrete gravity dam with and without the presence of reinforcement and evaluate the effectiveness of the strengthening measure. A new model concrete was proposed and applied for maintaining similitude with the prototype. A kind of extra fine wires as a substitute for rebar was embedded in four-points bending specimens of the model concrete to make of reinforced model concrete. The simulation of reinforcement concrete of the weak zones of high dam by the reinforced model concrete meets the similitude requirements. A tank filled with water is mounted at the upstream of the dam models to simulate the reservoir. The Peak Ground Acceleration (PGA) that induces the first tensile crack at the head of dam is applied as the basic index for estimating the overload capacity of high concrete dams. For the two model dams with and without strengthening tested, vulnerable parts of them are the necks near the crests. The results also indicate that the reinforcement is beneficial for improving the seismic-resistant capacity of the gravity dam.

• Structural Monitoring and Maintenance
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.103-124
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• 2019

Present study concerns the safety evaluation of SefidRud dam's block No. 18 regarding probable crack propagation in the foundation gallery under a MCE record. Accordingly, a 3D finite element model of the block in companion with the reservoir and the foundation is modeled. All the associated thermal and structural parameters are derived via calibration with the records of thermometers and pendulums installed inside the dam body. The origination of the cracks and their whereabouts are determined by primary thermal and static analyses and through a linear dynamic analysis the potential failure zone and their extent and level are studied. The foundation gallery is the most probable zone among the other intensive tensile stress area to compromise the dam stability. Therefore, the nonlinear analysis of this risky region is inevitable. The results depict the permissible expansion of the cracks inside the gallery even under another future earthquake in MCE level. As a consequence, the general dam performance is assessed safe in spite of the seepage flow rate growth from the gallery fractures.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.443-456
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• 2021

Structural design of the vertical displacements and shear strains in the earth fill (EF) dams has great importance in the structural engineering problems. Moreover, far fault earthquakes have significant seismic effects on seismic damage performance of EF dams like the near fault earthquakes. For this reason, three dimensional (3D) earthquake damage performance of Oroville dam is assessed considering different far-fault ground motions in this study. Oroville Dam was built in United States of America-California and its height is 234.7 m (770 ft.). 3D model of Oroville dam is modelled using FLAC3D software based on finite difference approach. In order to represent interaction condition between discrete surfaces, special interface elements are used between dam body and foundation. Non-reflecting seismic boundary conditions (free field and quiet) are defined to the main surfaces of the dam for the nonlinear seismic analyses. 6 different far-fault ground motions are taken into account for the full reservoir condition of Oroville dam. According to nonlinear seismic analysis results, the effects of far-fault ground motions on the nonlinear seismic settlement and shear strain behaviour of Oroville EF dam are determined and evaluated in detail. It is clearly seen that far-fault earthquakes have very significant seismic effects on the settlement-shear strain behaviour of EF dams and these earthquakes create vital important seismic damages on the swelling behaviour of dam body surface. Moreover, it is proposed that far-fault ground motions should not be ignored while modelling EF dams.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.7-15
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• 2023

The electric submersible pump (ESP) has been operating in production wells around the world because of its high applicability and operational efficiency among artificial lift techniques. When operating an ESP in a reservoir, variables such as temperature, pressure, gas/oil ratio, and flow rate are factors that affect ESP performance. In particular, free gas in the production fluid is a major factor that reduces the life and operational efficiency of ESP. This study presents the flow loop system which can implement the performance and damage tests of ESP considering field operating conditions to quantitatively analyze the variables that affect ESP performance. The developed apparatus in an integrated system that can diagnose the failure and causes of ESP, and detect leak of tubing by linking ESP and tubing as one system. In this study, the flow conditions for stable operation of ESP were identified through single phase and two phase flow experiments related to evaluation for the performance of ESP. The results provide the basic data to develop the failure prediction and diagnosis program of ESP, and are expected to be used for real-time monitoring for optimal operating conditions and failure diagnosis for ESP operation.

• Journal of Computational Design and Engineering
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• v.1 no.3
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• pp.173-186
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• 2014

The failure of a subsea production plant could induce fatal hazards and enormous loss to human lives, environments, and properties. Thus, for securing integrated design safety, core source technologies include subsea system integration that has high safety and reliability and a technique for the subsea flow assurance of subsea production plant and subsea pipeline network fluids. The evaluation of subsea flow assurance needs to be performed considering the performance of a subsea production plant, reservoir production characteristics, and the flow characteristics of multiphase fluids. A subsea production plant is installed in the deep sea, and thus is exposed to a high-pressure/ low-temperature environment. Accordingly, hydrates could be formed inside a subsea production plant or within a subsea pipeline network. These hydrates could induce serious damages by blocking the flow of subsea fluids. In this study, a simulation technology, which can visualize the system configuration of subsea production processes and can simulate stable flow of fluids, was introduced. Most existing subsea simulations have performed the analysis of dynamic behaviors for the installation of subsea facilities or the flow analysis of multiphase flow within pipes. The above studies occupy extensive research areas of the subsea field. In this study, with the goal of simulating the configuration of an entire deep sea production system compared to existing studies, a DES-based simulation technology, which can logically simulate oil production processes in the deep sea, was analyzed, and an implementation example of a simplified case was introduced.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.5 no.5
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• pp.463-483
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• 2013

Considering the influences of fluid penetration, casing, excavation processes of wellbore and perforation tunnels, the seepage-deformation finite element model of oil and gas well coupled with perforating technique is established using the tensile strength failure criterion, in which the user-defined subroutine is developed to investigate the dynamic evolvement of the reservoir porosity and permeability. The results show that the increases of perforation angle and decreases of perforation density lead to a higher fracture initiation pressure, while the changes of the perforation diameter and length have no evident influences on the fracture initiation pressure. As for initiation location for the fracture in wellbore, it is on the wellbore face while considering the presence of the casing. By contrast, the fractures firstly initiate on the root of the tunnels without considering casing. Besides, the initial fracture position is also related with the perforation angle. The fracture initiation position is located in the point far away from the wellbore face, when the perforation angle is around $30^{\circ}$; however, when the perforation angle is increased to $45^{\circ}$, a plane fracture is initiated from the wellbore face in the maximum horizontal stress direction; no fractures was found around perforation tunnels, when the angel is close to $90^{\circ}$. The results have been successfully applied in an oilfield, with the error of only 1.1% comparing the fracture initiation pressure simulated with the one from on-site experiment.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Hazard Mitigation
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• v.4 no.1 s.12
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• pp.25-31
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• 2004

Infiltration of rainfall causes railway embankment to be unstable and may result in failure. Basic relationship between the rainfall and stability of railway embankment is defined to analyze the stability of embankment by rainfall. An experimental study for defining of infiltration rate of rainfall into slope is conducted in the lab. The results of Rainfall Infiltration show that rainfall Infiltration is not equal to infiltration as like reservoir because rate of rainfall infiltration is controlled by slope angle. Based on these results, boundary condition of rainfall is altered and various numerical analysis are performed. The variation of shear strength, the degree of saturation and pore-water pressure for railway slope during rainfall can be predicted and the safety factor of railway slope can be expressed as the function of rainfall amount, namely rainfall index. Therefore, it is judged that this rainfall index can be a good tool for the rail-transport operation control.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.101-116
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• 2018

As one of the most important engineering structures, arch dams are huge constructions built with human hands and have strategical importance. Because of the fact that long construction duration, water supply, financial reasons, major loss of life and material since failure etc., the design of arch dams is very important problem and should be done by expert engineers to determine the structural behavior more accurately. Finite element analyses and non-destructive experimental measurements can be used to investigate the structural response, but there are some difficulties such as spending a long time while modelling, analysis and in-situ testing. Therefore, it is more useful to conduct the research on the laboratory conditions and to transform the obtained results into real constructions. Within the scope of this study, it is aimed to determine the structural behavior of arch dams considering experimentally validated prototype laboratory model using similitude and scaling laws. Type-1 arch dam, which is one of five arch dam types suggested at the "Arch Dams" Symposium in England in 1968 is selected as reference prototype model. The dam is built considering dam-reservoir-foundation interaction and ambient vibration tests are performed to validate the finite element results such as dynamic characteristics, displacements, principal stresses and strains. These results are considered as reference parameters and used to determine the real arch dam response with different scales factors such as 335, 400, 416.67 and 450. These values are selected by considering previously examined dam projects. Arch heights are calculated as 201 m, 240 m, 250 m and 270 m, respectively. The structural response is investigated between the model and prototype by using similarity requirements, field equations, scaling laws etc. To validate these results, finite element models are enlarged in the same scales and analyses are repeated to obtain the dynamic characteristics, displacements, principal stresses and strains. At the end of the study, it is seen that there is a good agreement between all results obtained by similarity requirements with scaling laws and enlarged finite element models.