J. Favier, J.Y. 0oi, Y.C. chung
Particulate Systems Analysis Conference
The Discrete Element (DE) method has been used extensively in recent times to study the behaviour of particulate assemblies. However, the numerical simulations are often not validated or compared with the experimental results. This paper describes the experiment and DE simulation of a confined compression test to investigate the mechanical response of a dense particulate system and the load transfer to the containing walls under vertical compression.After the particles were filled in the cylinder, a load was applied to the particulate assembly contained in the cylinder through a top platen driven by an INSTRON machine. The vertical load and vertical displacement was measured during loading. The forces transmitted to the walls were measured by using strain gauges fixed to the cylinder wall in both circumferential and axial directions. In addition, the vertical force transmitted to the bottom of the cylinder was also measured with another load cell on the bottom platen. The required mechanical and geometrical properties of the particles for use in the DE simulations were measured carefully in laboratory tests. A systematic investigation of the influence of initial packing on the loading behaviour was carried out. Comparisons between the numerical results and the experimental results were presented and discussed.
compression test, experiment, validation