Seismic fracture analysis of concrete gravity dams based on

nonlinear fracture mechanics

Wang Guanglun
a
, O.A. Pekau
b,
*, Zhang Chuhan
a, 1
, Wang Shaomin
a
a
Department of Hydraulic Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084 People's Republic of China
b
Department of Building, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Concordia University, Montreal, Canada, H3G 1M8
Received 28 July 1998; received in revised form 2 September 1999; accepted 28 October 1999
Abstract
In this paper, a numerical scheme based on nonlinear crack band theory is presented to study the 2D seismic
fracture behaviour of concrete gravity dams. A mesh size of the nite elements close to the characteristic size of the
crack band of concrete material is adopted, so that the strain softening behaviour of the concrete can be properly
taken into account. Also, a technique of nite element (FE) remesh at the crack front is presented by changing the
element edge pairs of the cracking element candidate to be parallel with the principal tensile stresses, in order to
better accommodate the crack extension. The procedure is veried using test results for a notched beam and then
applied to the seismic fracture analysis of the Koyna dam in India as a demonstration of prototype application. In
addition, several features of the present analysis inuencing the predicted concrete fracture process are also studied;
these comprise the magnitude of the fracture energy G
f
, the form of the strain-softening relation and the
introduction of FE remesh at the crack front. # 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Dams; Seismic; Fracture; Nonlinear; FE remesh
1. Introduction
Seismic fracture analysis of concrete gravity dams has long been a topic of research in dam
engineering. Considering that the characteristic dimension of a dam is much greater than the micro-
cracking or process zone at the crack tip, most studies to-date are based on the procedures of linear
elastic fracture mechanics (LEFM) [1,2]. Some researchers have also studied the nonlinear behaviour of
Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787
0013-7944/00/$ - see front matter # 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PII: S0013- 7944( 99) 00104- 6
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +1-514-848-7809; fax: +1-514-848-2809.
E-mail address: oapekau@civil.concordia.ca (O.A. Pekau).
1
Also, Adjunct Professor, Department of Building, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Concordia University, Montreal,
Canada H3G 1M8.

http://www.paper.edu.cn
concrete and earthquake performance of dams by using nonlinear fracture mechanics (NLFM) [3,4].
With regard to the application of NLFM procedure to the cracking study of mass concrete, there are
two basic procedures of modeling cracks commonly used in numerical analysis, namely the ctitious
crack model (FCM) presented by Hillerborg et al. [5] and the crack band model (CBM) by Bazant et al.
[68], both of which take the eects of strain softening into account by dierent assumptions.
In the ctitious crack model, the banded micro-crack region is simplied as a ctitious discrete crack,
in which the traction acting on the ctitious crack surface is represented by the transferred interior
forces of the fracture process zone. There is a determinate relation between the stresses on the ctitious
crack surface and the crack opening displacement; namely, it follows strain-softening behaviour. The
stress singularity at the crack tip is eliminated due to the existence of the process zone. Thus, the FCM
overcomes the limitation of LEFM and a nonlinear constitutive relation can be introduced in fracture
analysis according to the strain-softening mechanism.
By comparison the crack band model assumes that when concrete has Mode I damage a band
containing concentrated parallel ssures describes the crack, while the material outside the band remains
linear elastic. Crack band width l
c
is a characteristic parameter of the material. Having reached its
tensile strength, the crack band material exhibits strain-softening behaviour, and complies with the
stressstrain softening constitutive relation. In nite element (FE) analysis, if mesh size h is greater than
l
c
, the constitutive relation in the strain-softening stage must be modied so that the energy dissipated
by a crack band of width h equals that of l
c
, which is to ensure that the absorbed fracture energy per
unit length remains independent of the FE mesh size. Indeed, this is the most satisfactory feature of the
CBM as a crack extension model. However, one drawback to-date of the CBM is that the crack
developing direction is unavailable a priori, especially when the crack develops along a continuously
curved path.
In this paper, a numerical scheme based on the crack band theory is presented to study the nonlinear
fracture behaviour of concrete gravity dams under earthquake conditions. First, the formulation
proposed for the strain softening behaviour of concrete including the constitutive modeling of crack
closure and reopening is described and veried for static cracking of a notched beam. Also presented is
a FE remeshing method for propagation of a curved crack. Secondly, the cracking process of the Koyna
dam during the 1967 earthquake is evaluated numerically by employing the aforementioned numerical
scheme. A constitutive relation with bilinear softening is adopted for the Koyna concrete and the
cracking prole during the earthquake is obtained by an iteration procedure. From the results it is
concluded that both the upstream and downstream faces of the dam are predicted to experience
cracking through the upper part of the dam, which is consistent with the observed prototype behaviour.
2. Numerical model for fracture analysis of mass concrete
In the crack band theory, when an opening crack (Mode I) initiates, the fracture process of mass
concrete can be depicted by progressive micro-cracking of the material in a `crack band'. The concrete
material in the crack band will undergo strain-softening, in which the stress decreases as the strain
increases, while the material outside the crack band remains linear elastic. The energy absorbed in the
crack band of the softening zone per unit cross-section area is dened as the fracture energy G
f
, which is
a characteristic parameter of the material.
2.1. Crack initiation criterion
In most cases of 2D fracture problems in concrete dams the cracks appear to propagate nearly along
paths such that Mode I prevails at the crack front. Thus herein, when the maximum principal stress s
ct
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 68
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in an element exceeds the tensile strength f
t
of the concrete, a tensile crack is assumed to form in this
element. Uniaxial tensile strength is used as the criterion for crack initiation in this study, neglecting
thereby the eect that a triaxial stress environment may have on the strength to cause failure.
2.2. Post cracking behaviour
After crack initiation the concrete behaves as a strain-softening material, for which the tensile stress
normal to the crack decreases with increasing strain. The specic softening constitutive relation can be
obtained from uniaxial tensile tests of a concrete specimen with deformation control. For the complete
stress-strain relation as shown in Fig. 1, E
0
is the initial modulus and E
t
denotes the current secant
modulus. The fracture energy G
f
can be evaluated from
G
f
= l
c

s de (1)
where l
c
represents the crack band width of the fracture process zone given by the characteristic length
of the material; for concrete it is suggested [7] that l
c
= 3d with d denoting the maximum aggregate size
in the concrete.
In nite element analysis, when the size h of the element which models the width of the crack band is
greater than l
c
, (i.e. h > l
c
), the softening constitutive curve needs to be modied according to Bazant's
energy criterion [6] so that the fracture energy remains the same, as shown in Fig. 2. For a value of h
greater than h
0
= 2G
f
E
0
=f
2
t
a vertical drop in the stressstrain curve must be adopted, for which the
fracture energy of Eq. (1) is retained by replacing the tensile strength f
t
with a smaller equivalent value
f
eq
=

2E
0
G
f
=h
p
:
Fig. 1. Complete stressstrain curve in tension.
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2.3. Constitutive relation with softening behaviour
The total stressstrain relation for a concrete element undergoing cracking is given by
s
1
, s
2
, t
12
)
T
= [D]e
1
, e
2
, g
12
)
T
(2)
where subscripts 1 and 2 represent the local coordinates in accord with the crack directions shown in
Fig. 2. Softening branch modication for constant fracture energy G
f
:
Fig. 3. Crack element and local coordinates.
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Fig. 3 and [D] represents the material property matrix for the same local coordinate orientation and is
given by [8]:
(a) For linear elastic behaviour
[D] =
2
4
E
/
E
/
n 0
E
/
n E
0
n
2
E
/
0
0 0 G
3
5
(3)
where E
/
= E
0
=(1 n
2
) and n denotes Poisson's ratio.
(b) For strain-softening behaviour
Assuming that the cracking takes place in the direction of local coordinate 1
[D] =
2
4
E
/
t
E
/
t
n 0
E
/
t
n E
0
n
2
E
/
t
0
0 0 b
g
G
3
5
(4)
where E
/
t
=E
0
E
t
=(E
0
n
2
E
t
); G = shear modulus; E
t
= E
t
(e
1
), the current secant modulus; and b
g
is
the shear retention factor representing the extent of aggregate interlock on the crack surfaces. The
shear retention factor b
g
has the following implications: when material is in the linear elastic range
b
g
= 1 and the D matrix returns to Eq. (3) and; when the concrete is in the softening range
0Rb
g
< 1, meaning that elastic aggregate interlock eects are assumed after cracking.
A solution procedure with iteration is adopted to implement the above constitutive softening model in
fracture analysis. Because both the ascending and the softening parts of the stressstrain relationship are
involved, total stresses and strains with secant moduli are employed in the iteration scheme. Four-node
elements with 2 2 Gaussian integration points are used to evaluate the element stiness. Since the
monitoring of the cracking process is based on the principal tensile stresses at the individual element
level, the principal stresses and strains of each element are obtained by averaging the corresponding
counterparts at all the Gaussian points. For the stress eld solution at each time step, the element which
possesses the largest principal stress s
ct
is selected and the value of s
ct
is compared with the tensile
strength f
t
of the material. If s
ct
> f
t
, iteration is carried out. As shown in Fig. 4, for iteration step `i'
the secant modulus E
i
t
is used to replace the initial elastic value of E
0
or the previous value of E
i1
t
: The
new stressstrain matrix D(E
i
t
) is formed and the new equilibrium equations are solved. Such iteration
steps are repeated until convergence is obtained, or e
i
1
re
u
for the element. In this analysis, a damage
factor Z
i
= (E
i
t
=E
0
) is dened and the condition {(Z
i
Z
i1
)=Z
i
]RD is considered as convergence, where
D denotes the tolerance.
2.4. Simplied constitutive relation accounting for crack closing and reopening
During the process of cyclic loading, the cracks may close and reopen both periodically and
progressively. Based on the results of cyclic tensile tests given in Ref. [9], the simplied constitutive
model accounting for crack closing and reopening shown in Fig. 5 is adopted. The element remains
linear with modulus of E
0
before cracking and also subsequently after the crack closes. Whenever the
stress normal to the crack surface becomes positive (tensile) again, the crack will reopen with
continuously decreasing secant modulus E
t
until a macro-crack forms at strain e = e
u
:
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 71
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3. Verication of numerical model
To conrm the validity of the proposed numerical model, a typical problem of Mode I fracture is
studied in this paper. A fracture damage experiment of a notched beam was performed by Petersson [10]
with the method of displacement control loading. A numerical analysis for this notched beam, with the
Fig. 4. Iteration scheme with strain control.
Fig. 5. Closingreopening model for material.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 72
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same geometric and material parameters as that of the experiment, is conducted. The form of the
softening curve adopted in the analysis follows the bilinear softening branch presented by Hillerborg
[11]. The geometric properties and the nite element mesh are shown in Fig. 6. The concrete
characteristic parameters adopted in the analysis are: E = 3:0 10
4
MPa, n = 0:2, f
t
= 3:33 MPa, G
f
=
124 N/m, and b
g
= 0:001: The complete load-deection curves from the experiment including softening
behaviour, measured at the centre of the beam crest, are shown in Fig. 7 and compared with the
computed load-deection curve of the notched beam when loaded also by displacement control. From
the comparison between the two curves, it is obvious that the analytical curve is basically in accordance
with the experimental data. It is noted that the numerical model adopted in the analysis appears feasible
for the fracture analysis of concrete and the computer implementation provides good accuracy.
4. Remesh for curved crack extension
When the crack path is not known in advance or when the crack follows a curved path, the crack
extension is determined by the stress distribution ahead of the blunt crack front. Since the mesh
discretization ahead of the crack front may inuence the local stress distribution, dierent mesh
discretization may result in dierent proles of the crack extension.
To study this problem, the foregoing example of the notched beam was again used in order to
examine the proles obtained from dierent mesh alignments. Three dierent mesh discretizations were
designed for this comparison, namely: (a) the normal vertical and horizontal mesh of Fig. 8(a); (b) the
45-degree skewed element mesh of Fig. 8(b); and (c) a combined alignment with vertical elements along
the crack path and inclined ones on both sides as shown in Fig. 8(c). From the resultant crack proles
Fig. 6. Three-point test of notched beam: (a) test specimen; (b) FE discretization.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 73
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shown in Fig. 8(a)(c), it is evident that the prole of crack extension depends closely on the mesh
alignment along the cracking path itself. While the skewed element mesh of Fig. 8(b) produces a prole
of zig-zag shape, it is observed in Figs. 8(a) and (c) that only the element mesh along the crack path
controls the pattern of the crack extension.
Based on this test example, a remeshing technique is presented to accommodate the above problem. It
consists of readjusting the element boundaries on the crack front to be parallel to the orientation of the
principal tensile stresses. This procedure appears able to provide a smooth prole and avoid the zig-zag
phenomenon in crack propagation. The detailed procedure is as follows:
1. After selecting an element as a candidate for possible cracking, adjust the element mesh in accordance
with the direction of the maximum principal stress of the element. As shown in Fig. 9, locally modify
the shape of the element boundary so that it will be parallel and normal to the directions of the two
principal stresses respectively, i.e. change the shape of element A to A'. Repeat the calculation of the
element stress until the element boundary corresponds with the direction of the tensile cracking.
2. Having modied the shape of element A to A', adjust the shape of element B' to match the
orientation of element A'. With cracking assumed accepted to be of Mode I type and since the load
increment is small in each time step, crack extension will deviate in direction by only a small amount
compared with the existing crack. Thus the adjusted shape of element B' will reect satisfactorily the
stress eld at the crack band front.
3. When the tensile stress of element B' is greater than the tensile strength f
t
of the concrete, element B'
will undergo cracking. Readjust the mesh line of element B' as in step (1) so that the direction of the
element mesh will be parallel to that of the computed principal stress.
4. Repeat the same procedure of adjustment for elements C
/
, D
/
, . . ., keeping the boundary of the
element mesh parallel to the direction of principal stresses ahead of the crack front, until the crack
becomes stable or the crack extends across the whole section of the dam.
At the current stage, the remeshing process is accomplished manually, i.e. for each element at the
crack front in which the principal tensile stress exceeds the tensile strength of the concrete, the sides of
Fig. 7. Complete load-deection curves for notched beam.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 74
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the neighboring elements and the corresponding coordinates are readjusted to satisfy the parallel rule.
Such realignment of elements is repeated for every initial occurrence of element cracking until either the
cracking stops or penetrates through the whole dam section. After the readjustment of the element
coordinates, the nodal variables (displacements, velocities and accelerations) and element stresses will
undergo changes accordingly.
It should be noted that the nodal number, i.e. the total number of degrees-of-freedom, remains
unchanged in the preceding alignment process, with only a few nodal coordinates changed. Thus, the
Fig. 8. Crack proles for dierent mesh alignment.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 75
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F
i
g
.
9
.
F
E
r
e
m
e
s
h
a
t
c
r
a
c
k
b
a
n
d
f
r
o
n
t
.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 76
http://www.paper.edu.cn
dimensions of the property matrix of the system remain constant during the process of adjusting the
crack front elements.
5. Seismic fracture analysis of Koyna dam
The Koyna concrete gravity dam, 103 m high, is located on the Koyna river in the west of the Indian
Peninsula. In 1967, a 6.5-magnitude earthquake shook the region with maximum acceleration measured
at the foundation gallery of 0.49 and 0.34 g in horizontal direction normal to the dam axis and in the
vertical, respectively. The time histories of the Koyna earthquake are shown in Fig. 10. Severe damage
was found in the form of horizontal cracking observed on both the upstream and downstream faces of
the upper part of dam monoliths. Leakage phenomenon was also observed at some monoliths, implying
that the cracks may have penetrated across the dam section.
5.1. Material parameters and loading
The material parameters adopted in the analysis are shown in Table 1. The values of the parameters
are obtained from the material tests at the dam site [12], except those of fracture energy G
f
and damping
ratio x, which were estimated from other data in the literature. Since there is no experimental data
available for the fracture energy of the Koyna dam, an estimated value of 250 N/m was assumed based
on the procedure of evaluation given in Ref. [13]. Stiness proportional damping is assumed with the
Fig. 10. Koyna earthquake records of 11 December 1976: (a) transverse; (b) vertical.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 77
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Table 1
Material properties of Koyna dam
Elastic modulus
(MPa)
Compressive strength
(MPa)
Tensile strength
(MPa)
Poisson's ratio n Damping ratio x Fracture energy
(N/m)
Unit weight
(kN/m
3
)
3.16 10
4
24.6 2.46 0.2 0.05 250
a
26.4
a
From Ref. [13].
Fig. 11. FE discretization of Koyna dam.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 78
http://www.paper.edu.cn
damping coecient calibrated to provide x = 0:05 for the fundamental mode of the initial linear
structure. During the cracking process, the viscous damping model is replaced by a quasi-linear model
with the damping coecient changed in terms of stiness matrix K(t): The values of b
g
used in the
analysis vary between zero and 1.0 depending on the status of closing or reopening of the cracks. The
procedure for determination of the value of b
g
is similar to that in Ref. [4]. The bilinear softening curve
of Hillerborg [11] employed in the preceding fracture analysis of the notched beam verication is
adopted here also.
Fig. 12. Seismic fracture response of Koyna dam: (a) horizontal crest displacement; (b) crack opening displacements.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 79
http://www.paper.edu.cn
T
a
b
l
e
2
F
r
a
c
t
u
r
e
p
r
o
c
e
s
s
o
f
d
o
w
n
s
t
r
e
a
m
c
r
a
c
k
o
f
t
h
e
K
o
y
n
a
d
a
m
O
r
d
e
r
N
o
.
o
f
e
l
e
m
e
n
t
t
=
3
:
8
6
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
8
7
0
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
8
7
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
8
8
0
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
8
8
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
8
9
0
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
8
9
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
0
0
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
0
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
1
0
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
1
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
2
0
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
2
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
3
0
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
3
5
(
s
)
t
=
3
:
9
4
0
(
s
)
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
a(
8
)
E
t
=
E
0
1
4
1
5

6
5
1
.
7
7

1
0

3
2
4
1
4

6
6
2
.
5
0

1
0

2
3
4
5
3

6
6
3
.
6
8

1
0

2
4
4
5
2

6
7
5
.
2
2

1
0

2
5
4
9
1

6
6
8
.
6
4

1
0

2
6
4
9
0

6
9
0
.
2
5
1
7
4
8
9

6
9
7
.
2
5

1
0

3
8
5
2
8

6
9
2
.
1
5

1
0

2
9
5
2
7

6
9
3
.
9
4

1
0

2
1
0
5
2
6

6
9
7
.
0
9

1
0

2
1
1
5
6
5

6
9
0
.
1
8
2
1
2
5
6
4

6
9
1
.
3
1

1
0

2
1
3
5
6
3

6
9
3
.
5
8

1
0

2
1
4
6
0
2

6
6
6
.
6
4

1
0

2
1
5
6
0
1

6
5
0
.
1
7
0
2
.
1
2

1
0

3
1
6
6
0
0

6
7
3
.
4
7

1
0

2
1
7
6
3
9

5
7
0
.
1
1
4
1
8
6
3
8

6
0
3
.
4
8

1
0

2
1
9
6
7
7

5
8
0
.
1
2
2
2
0
7
1
6

5
5
8
.
8
1

1
0

2
8
.
6
5

1
0

3
2
1
7
1
5

5
2
9
.
4
0

1
0

2
1
.
3
2

1
0

2
2
2
7
5
4

4
5
0
.
1
0
3
1
.
7
0

1
0

2
2
3
7
9
3

3
6
0
.
1
1
1
1
.
8
4

1
0

2
2
4
8
7
2

2
6
0
.
1
2
2
2
.
1
0

1
0

2
2
5
9
1
1

1
5
0
.
1
3
0
2
.
3
7

1
0

2
2
6
9
5
1

1
3
0
.
1
3
2
2
.
5
0

1
0

2
2
7
9
9
0

1
5
0
.
1
3
7
2
.
6
6

1
0

3
2
8
1
0
3
0

1
6
0
.
1
4
3
3
.
1
9

1
0

2
2
9
1
0
6
9

1
6
0
.
1
9
2
4
.
1
5

1
0

2
3
0
1
1
0
9

1
6
0
.
2
9
4
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Since the rock of the dam foundation is basalt with an elastic modulus of 7 10
4
MPa which is twice
that of the dam concrete, and also since the earthquake acceleration components were recorded near the
dam foundation, the foundation is modeled as being rigid.
In this analysis, the static loads including gravity and water pressure, and the dynamic loads including
earthquakes in the stream and the vertical direction, are considered.
5.2. Finite element discretization
As shown in Fig. 11, according to the results of linear elastic analysis the element discretization with
rened mesh measuring 0.5 0.5 m is adopted in the region where occurrence of stress concentration is
expected. Since the element size approaches the characteristic length l
c
of concrete (l
c
= 3d, where d =
0:15 m and l
c
= 0:45 m for the dam concrete), the width of the crack band can fully reect the strain-
softening behaviour of concrete and the assumed constitutive curve can be used for the analysis without
any modication.
5.3. Numerical results
Fracture analysis of Koyna dam under the 1967 earthquake is conducted employing the numerical
model described above. The time step used in the analysis is 0.005 s.
The responses of both the linear elastic and the fracture cases are analyzed and shown in Fig. 12. Fig.
12(a) shows that rupture of the dam occurs quite abruptly at the rst major displacement of the dam
crest in the positive (upstream) direction. This is also seen in the associated crack-mouth opening
displacement (COD) data of Fig. 12(b), where the fracture process can be described as follows:
At the time instant t = 3.865 s, an initial crack appears at the point of slope discontinuity on the
downstream face of the dam. After a period of 0.075 s, i.e. at t = 3.940 s, the downstream crack
extends about two-thirds through the width of the dam section, and then stops propagating with a total
of 30 elements being ruptured. At t = 3.995 s, the downstream crack begins to close, and is completely
closed at t = 4.025 s. An initial upstream crack at a height of 59.25 m above the base starts
Table 3
Fracture process of upstream crack of the Koyna dam
Order No. of element t = 4.135 (s ) t = 4.140 (s ) t = 4.145 (s ) t = 4.150 (s )
a (8) E
t
=E
0
a (8) E
t
=E
0
a (8) E
t
=E
0
a (8) E
t
=E
0
1' 856 90
2' 857 90
3' 858 89
4' 859 89
5' 860 89 5.28 10
3
6' 861 88 1.80 10
2
7' 862 88 4.11 10
2
8' 863 89 0.112
9' 864 89
10' 865 86 6.10 10
3
11' 866 85 2.76 10
2
12' 867 82 9.45 10
2
13' 868 83 7.57 10
3
14' 869 73 6.34 10
2
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propagating at t = 4.135 s. The upstream crack extends horizontally to reach the front of the existing
downstream crack. The computation is then stopped with a total of 14 upstream elements having
ruptured. Since the prole of the upstream crack is basically horizontal, especially before the time
instant t = 4.145 s at which the two cracks have closely approached each other, remeshing was deemed
unnecessary for the upstream crack. The detailed propagation process of the both cracks is described by
the data presented in Tables 2 and 3. Fig. 13 shows the nal crack prole of Koyna dam under the 1967
earthquake, where the shaded portions represent the ruptured elements of the cracking path.
Based on the preceding seismic fracture analysis of the Koyna dam, the following observations can be
summarized: From the data of the crack propagation process given in Tables 2 and 3, it can be seen
that a fracture process zone always exists ahead of the macro-crack front. The length of this zone is
Fig. 13. Rupture pattern of Koyna dam from seismic fracture analysis.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 82
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approximately 0.52.5 m (i.e. about 315 times the maximum size of the concrete aggregate). Because
during fracture of concrete the energy absorbed in the softening process needs to be overcome, the
existence of the fracture process zone will inhibit crack extension. Since the mechanical behaviour of the
fracture process zone is reected by the softening constitutive relation of the concrete, both the form of
the softening curve and the magnitude of the fracture energy G
f
will inuence the length of the crack
prole as well as the extension direction. From the downstream crack extension process shown in Table
2, it can be seen that the crack propagation comprises a number (15) of time steps over a time period of
0.075 s. The reason for this stage-wise, although short duration, cracking process is probably because
the uncracked horizontal section size of the dam decreases during the process of crack extension, leading
the compressive stresses produced by the dead weight to increase suciently to restrain the crack
extension and stopping the cracking temporarily.
6. Discussion of factors inuencing cracking
Although in general various factors inuence the concrete cracking process, for the model presented
in this paper the following examines two factors of particular signicance to the results obtained in the
present study.
Fig. 14. Fracture proles of Koyna dam for dierent G
f
:
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 83
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Fig. 15. Idealized softening curves for same G
f
:
Fig. 16. Loaddeection curves of notched beam for dierent forms of softening curve.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 84
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6.1. Inuence of fracture energy
As mentioned previously, during extension of concrete cracking the fracture energy released must
overcome the energy dissipated by the softening process of concrete. In the present Koyna dam fracture
analysis, the eects of two dierent values of fracture energy G
f
are compared when other conditions
including static and dynamic loads remain the same. Fig. 14 shows the dierent crack proles of the
dam for the two values of fracture energy. The solid segments of Fig. 14 represent the fracture results
with G
f
= 1000 N/m, whereas the dashed portions represent the crack prole for G
f
= 250 N/m, the
latter having been used also for the prole shown in Fig. 13. It is obvious that the length of the
downstream crack is reduced greatly when the value of G
f
is increased by a factor of 4. As expected,
these results demonstrate that the crack prole will be aected signicantly by the value of the fracture
energy, the larger the fracture energy the shorter the length of cracking.
Furthermore, even for the same value of fracture energy, the nal fracture results can still dier if
dierent forms of softening curve are employed, because dierent values of E
t
will be involved in the
nonlinear iteration. The complete loaddeection curve of the notched beam of Fig. 6 is recalculated,
but with the form of the softening curve changed in the recalculation from bilinear to linear as shown in
Fig. 15. It should be noted that the value of G
f
is kept the same (124 N/m) for both cases.
A comparison of the results for linear and bilinear softening is shown in Fig. 16. The dierence
between the two loaddeection curves results from the variation of the secant modulus adopted in the
calculation, i.e. to the left of point A in Fig. 15 the secant modulus of linear is larger than that of
bilinear softening under the same deection, while to the right of point A the situation is reversed
compared to that of the left. A similar phenomenon is also noted in Fig. 16, i.e. to the left of point A'
the load for linear is larger than that of bilinear softening at the same deection, whereas to the right of
Fig. 17. Rupture patterns for Koyna dam computed with and without FE remesh.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 85
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point A' it is the opposite. Thus, both the magnitude of G
f
and the form of the softening curve need to
be included in assessing the importance of the fracture energy.
6.2. Inuence of FE remesh
The aforementioned method of FE remesh was adopted to remedy the diculty in simulating a
curved fracture prole by the crack band model. To demonstrate the method's eectiveness under the
same material parameters, load conditions and nite element discretization, the cracking process of the
Koyna dam is re-analyzed without remesh of the elements in the cracking region. Fig. 17 shows the
comparison of the results with and without remesh. It can be seen that there are obvious dierences
between the two predicted fracture proles. The downstream FE discretization of the cracking region
without remesh favors crack extension in the horizontal direction and absorbs more energy associated
with the zig-zag pattern leading the downstream crack extension to stop somewhat earlier.
7. Conclusions
1. Based on Bazant's crack band model, the proposed procedure for the 2D seismic fracture analysis of
concrete dams reects the strain localization phenomenon of the concrete and incorporates the
characteristic length of the material in the crack extension process. In the implementation for the
seismic fracture of the Koyna dam a nite element mesh close to the characteristic size of the crack
band (three times the maximum aggregate size of concrete) is used, which suces to take into
account the strain-softening behaviour of concrete and its strain localization characteristics. Also a
method of FE remesh according to the direction of the crack propagation is adopted and good
agreement is obtained between the numerical results and eld measurements of the prototype
damaged dam. This indicates that the procedure adopted in this paper is eective for the fracture
analysis of concrete structures such as gravity dams.
2. Since a very ne element mesh coupled with the secant modulus method of iteration is adopted in the
analysis, the strain-softening characteristics in the constitutive relation of the material can be
considered in realistic manner. The inuence on structure fracture features of dierent forms of the
softening curve, including dierent values of fracture energy, can be taken into account. The results
show that the magnitude of the fracture energy and the form of the softening curve have obvious
eects on the fracture features of the structure.
3. The presented technique for remeshing the elements of the fracture process zone by changing two of
the element boundaries to be parallel with the orientation of the principal tensile stresses has proven
eective to depict the curved crack extension path. The results with and without element remesh are
compared and signicant dierences in terms of crack prole have been observed.
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledged the nancial support for this work, which was provided by the
Chinese National Key Projects on Basic Research and Applied Research (B) and the Natural Sciences
and Engineering Research Council of Canada under Grant No. A8258. Appreciation is also expressed to
Dr. Jin Feng and Mr. Liao Bangzheng for their assistance.
W. Guanglun et al. / Engineering Fracture Mechanics 65 (2000) 6787 86
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