Earthquake simulation in Abaqus

Why earthquake simulation in Abaqus?

Earthquakes! Such a disastrous phenomenon in nature. Such lives are destroyed by earthquakes. During an earthquake, the shaking can cause loose dirt to become liquid. Buildings, bridges, pipelines, and roadways may become unstable due to liquefaction, sinking into the earth, collapsing, or dissolving. Large unsupported wall lengths, weak wall-to-roof connections, and a lack of bond beams all contribute to wall separation and damage caused by an out-of-plane mechanism. As a result, the entire wall or the bulk of it, collapses during an earthquake. What do we engineers can do about it?! This is a natural phenomenon, and we cannot stop that, but we can design our structures to they don’t get collapsed or even damaged by earthquakes. This is how we can save lives. One of the inexpensive and fast ways is to use finite element analyses to predict the structural behaviour when subjected to earthquakes. The earthquake Abaqus simulation is one of the finite element ways which gives you such capabilities to simulate earthquakes so you can design earthquake-resistant structures.

The ability of a building to bend, wobble, and deform without collapsing is referred to as ductility, and it is frequently incorporated into earthquake-resistant designs. When subjected to the horizontal or vertical shear stresses of an earthquake, a ductile structure can bend and flex.

But how can we simulate earthquakes in Abaqus? I recommend reading the description of the workshops, which all three of them are practical examples and give you some ideas on how to simulate in Abaqus. Who knows! Maybe this package helps you save some lives.

workshop 1: Simulation earthquake Abaqus over gravity dam in interaction with water and soil by using the infinite element method

This video simulates an earthquake load over a gravity dam in contact with water and soil. All components are two-dimensionally modeled, and bulk modulus has been used for the dam CDP material, the soil Mohr-Coulomb, and the water acoustic property. For dirt far from the foundation, an infinite element was made. For this kind of study, a dynamic implicit step should be used. The simulation time was 10 seconds, and the acceleration from the earthquake was applied to the depth of the soil.

Workshop 2: Simulation earthquake load over a tank contain water and investigate sloshing phenomenon

This video simulation looks at the effects of an earthquake load on a water-filled tank and the sloshing phenomenon. Modelled as three-dimensional deformable pieces are the water and tank. It has been used to measure the viscosity of water using the Us-Up equation and elastic-plastic material for concrete tanks. The duration of the earthquake Abaqus load dynamic explicit step is 55 seconds. An implanted Lagrangian technique is used to model water sloshing. Water started to slosh during the earthquake, and the waves’ collision with the tank wall stressed the wall. Below are some simulation-related figures that you can see.

Workshop 3: Simulation earthquake load over masonry wall concrete-brick using Abaqus micro model

Engineers and scientists are paying more attention to how vulnerable buildings and infrastructure are to blast loads as terrorist attacks increase on a global scale. These loads could have a variety of consequences, from minor damage to structural collapse and significant human casualties. The oldest and most popular construction material, masonry, utilized in both masonry buildings and infill walls in buildings made of reinforced concrete (RC) frames, sustain the most damage. Even without total destruction or structural collapse, the flying debris may result in serious fatalities or injuries. As a result, various researchers made an attempt to look into workable ways to strengthen masonry walls in order to improve their resistance to blast loads. The application of fiber-reinforced polymers (FRP) to the surface of unreinforced masonry (URM) walls is one of the most often used methods of upgrading URM walls, despite the fact that a number of procedures have been tested. A wall’s flexural resistance needs to be improved since the blast puts pressure on the wall’s surface.

In this simulation, two scenarios were examined: the first involved an earthquake load applied to a masonry wall, and the second involved a pressure and transverse load. The concrete column and bricks are represented as three-dimensional elements in the model. Below is a picture of the finished product.

To replicate the first example, three dynamic explicit steps were employed, and one step was used to represent the second phase. There are two ways to model the mortar. The first method involves placing a solid portion between the block’s horizontal and vertical contact surfaces and giving it traction separation behaviour. The second method takes into account mortar behavior by using the cohesive contact property, three stiffness data, and damage with evolution. The second option is chosen in this simulation. The gap between the block contact surfaces and the mortar has collapsed as a result of the enormous deformation caused by the seismic stress during the simulation. Below are some results figures that you can see.

I hope you have got enough information about the earthquake Abaqus simulation; if you have any questions about this tutorial, contact us via online chat here on the left side of the page.

It would be helpful to see Abaqus Documentation to understand how it would be hard to start an Abaqus simulation without any Abaqus tutorial.