• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.421-432
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• 2020

Cutting of rocks is very common encountered in tunneling and mining during underground excavations. A deep understanding of rock-tool interaction can promote industrial applications significantly. In this paper, a distinct element method based approach, PFC^3D, is adopted to simulate the rock cutting under different operation conditions (cutting velocity, depth of cut and rake angle) and with various tool geometries (tip angle, tip wear and tip shape). Simulation results showed that the cutting force and accumulated number of cracks increase with increasing cutting velocity, cut depth, tip angle and pick abrasion. The number of cracks and cutting force decrease with increasing negative rake angle and increase with increasing positive rake angle. The numerical approach can offer a better insight into the rock-tool interaction during the rock cutting process. The proposed numerical method can be used to assess the rock cuttability, to estimate the cutting performance, and to design the cutter head.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.72 no.4
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• pp.469-477
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• 2019

The understanding of tool-rock interaction mechanism is of high essence for improving the rock breaking efficiency and optimizing the drilling parameters in mechanical rock breaking. In this study, the tool-rock interaction models of indentation and cutting are carried out by employing the discrete element method (DEM) to examine the rock failure modes of various brittleness rocks and critical indentation and cutting depths of the ductile to brittle failure mode transition. The results show that the cluster size and inter-cluster to intra-cluster bond strength ratio are the key factors which influence the UCS magnitude and the UCS to BTS ratio. The UCS to BTS strength ratio can be increased to a more realistic value using clustered rock model so that the characteristics of real rocks can be better represented. The critical indentation and cutting depth decrease with the brittleness of rock increases and the decreasing rate reduces dramatically against the brittleness value. This effort may lead to a better understanding of rock breaking mechanisms in mechanical excavation, and may contribute to the improvement in the design of rock excavation machines and the related parameters determination.

• 한국지구물리탐사학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.162-169
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• 2003

Excavation by TBM can be characterized by a rock-machine interaction during the cutting process on a small scale, but on a large scale the interaction between the rock mass and TBM becomes very significant. For the planning and evaluation of TBM tunnelling it needs to understand rock fracture mechanism by a cutter or cutters on a small scale, and to estimate penetration rate, advance rate and utilization on a large scale. In this study rock chipping mechanism due to cutter-penetration is analysed by numerical simulation, showing that rock chipping is mainly occurred by tensile failure. Also, through the analysis of factors that affect on TBM procedures in various assessment systems, it is determined that the key elements that should be considered in the planning and evaluation of TBM tunnelling are classified into rock properties, the geological structures and properties of rock mass, and the structural and functional specifications of the machine. The user-friendly assessment tool is developed, so that penetration rate, advance rate and TBM utilization are evaluated from various input data. The tool developed in this study can be applied to a practical TBM tunnelling by understanding TBM tunnelling procedures.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.96-107
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• 1993

This paper deals with the analysis of rock slope stability using the distinct element method. This method consists in analysis of the interaction of discrete block assemblage delimited by elementary joints, which permits to consider the heterogeneous, anisotropic and discontinuous features of the rock mass. In particular, we were able to show that this method, and especially the BRIG3D software, is an outstanding tool which gives informations of greatest interest in order to analyze the toppling mechanisms. We have confirmed the fundamental role of the rock mass structure with different simulations. In the case of toppling phenomena, the essential parameter is the dip of major discontinuities. It has an influence on the intensity and volume of deformations. The anisotropic and heterogeneous features of the rock mass play also an important role. It is proved by insertion of thick rock bars in the structure or varying rock block sizes in the mass. These models modified considerably the stress distribution and the deformation distribution. Finally, we have analyzed the influence of mechanical parameters such as friction angle and tangential stiffness.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.429-437
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• 2017

In this study, the effect of the tensile strength and ratio of disc spacing to penetration depth on the efficiency of tunnel boring machine (TBM) is investigated using Particle flow code (PFC) in two dimensions. Models with dimensions of $150{\times}70mm$ made of rocks with four different tensile strength values of 5 MPa, 10 MPa, 15 MPa and 20 MPa were separately analyzed and two "U" shape cutters with width of 10 mm were penetrated into the rock model by velocity rate of 0.1 mm/s. The spacing between cutters was also varied in this study. Failure patterns for 5 different penetration depths of 3 mm, 4 mm, 5 mm, 6 mm, and 7 mm were registered. Totally 100 indentation test were performed to study the optimal tool-rock interaction. An equation relating mechanical rock properties with geometric characteristics for the optimal TBM performance is proposed. The results of numerical simulations show that the effective rock-cutting condition corresponding to the minimum specific energy can be estimated by an optimized disc spacing to penetration depth, which, in fact, is found to be proportional to the rock's tensile strength.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.161-176
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• 1999

A powerful numerical method that can be used for modeling rock-structure interaction is the Discontinuous Deformation Analysis (D D A) method developed by Shi in 1988. In this method, rock masses are treated as systems of finite and deformable blocks. Large rock mass deformations and block movements are allowed. Although various extensions of the D D A method have been proposed in the literature, the method is not capable of modeling water-block interaction, sequential loading or unloading and rock reinforcement; three features that are needed when modeling surface or underground excavation in fractured rock. This paper presents three new extensions to the D D A method. The extensions consist of hydro-mechanical coupling between rock blocks and steady water flow in fractures, sequential loading or unloading, and rock reinforcement by rockbolts, shotcrete or concrete lining. Examples of application of the D D A method with the new extensions are presented. Simulations of the underground excavation of the \ulcornerUnju Tunnel\ulcorner in Korea were carried out to evaluate the influence of fracture flow, excavation sequence and reinforcement on the tunnel stability. The results of the present study indicate that fracture flow and improper selection of excavation sequence could have a destabilizing effect on the tunnel stability. On the other hand, reinforcement by rockbolts and shotcrete can stabilize the tunnel. It is found that, in general, the D D A program with the three new extensions can now be used as a practical tool in the design of underground structures. In particular, phases of construction (excavation, reinforcement) can now be simulated more realistically.

• Explosives and Blasting
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.31-38
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• 2016

The hydrodynamics code is a numerical tool developed for modeling high velocity impacts where the materials are assumed to behave like fluids. The hydrodynamics code is widely used for solving impact problems, such as rock blasting using explosives. For a realistic simulation of rock blasting, it is necessary to model explosives numerically so that the interaction problem between rock and explosives can be solved in a fully coupled manner. The equation of state of explosives, which describes the state of the material under given physical conditions, should be established. In this paper, we introduced the hydrodynamics code used for explosion process modeling, the equation of state of explosives, and the determination of associated parameters.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.13 no.6
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• pp.561-572
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• 2017

Seismic base isolation has been accepted as one of the most popular design procedures to protect important structures against earthquakes. However, due to lack of information and experimental data the application of base isolation is quite limited to nuclear power plant (NPP) industry. Moreover, the effects of inelastic behavior of soil beneath base-isolated NPP have raised questions to the effectiveness of isolation device. This study applies the wavelet analysis to investigate the effects of soil-structure interaction (SSI) on the seismic response of a base-isolated NPP structure. To evaluate the SSI effects, the NPP structure is modelled as a lumped mass stick model and combined with a soil model using the concept of cone models. The lead rubber bearing (LRB) base isolator is used to adopt the base isolation system. The shear wave velocity of soil is varied to reflect the real rock site conditions of structure. The comparison between seismic performance of isolated structure and non-isolated structure has drawn. The results show that the wavelet analysis proves to be an efficient tool to evaluate the SSI effects on the seismic response of base-isolated structure and the seismic performance of base-isolated NPP is not sensitive to the effects in this case.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Agricultural Engineers
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• v.48 no.6
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• pp.45-56
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• 2006

The finite element method is a practical tool to compute the response of the irregularly layered soil deposit to the base-rock motions. The method is useful not only in estimating the interaction between the structure and the surrounding soil as a whole and the local behavior of the contacting area in detail, but also in predicting the resulting behavior of the superstructure affected by such soil-structure interactions. However, the computation of finite element analysis is marched in the time domain (TD), while the site response analysis has been carried out mostly in the frequency domain (FD) with equivalent linear analysis. This study is intended to compare the results of the TD and FD analysis with focus on the peak response accelerations and the predominant frequencies, and thus to evaluate the applicability and the validity of the finite element analysis in the site response analysis. The comparison shows that one can obtain the results very close to that of FD analysis, from the finite element analysis by including sufficiently large width of foundation in the model and further by applying partial mode superposition. The finite element analysis turned out to be well agreeing with FD analysis in their computed results of the peak acceleration and the acceleration response spectra, especially at the surface layer.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.167-183
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• 2021

It is essential to understand the complex thermo-hydro-mechanical-chemical (THMC) coupled behavior in the engineered barrier system and natural barrier system to secure the high-level radioactive waste repository's long-term safety. The heat from the high-level radioactive waste induces thermal pressurization and vaporization of groundwater in the repository system. Groundwater inflow affects the saturation variation in the engineered barrier system, and the saturation change influences the heat transfer and multi-phase flow characteristics in the buffer. Due to the complexity of the coupled behavior, a numerical simulation is a valuable tool to predict and evaluate the THMC interaction effect on the disposal system and safety assessment. To enhance the knowledge of THMC coupled interaction and validate modeling techniques in geological systems. DECOVALEX, an international cooperation project, was initiated in 1992, and KAERI has participated in the projects since 2008 in Korea. In this study, we introduced the main contents of all tasks in the DECOVALEX-2023, the current DECOVALEX phase, to the rock mechanics and geotechnical researchers in Korea.