Seismic Analysis Of Arch Dam With The Effects Of The Joint And Shear Key

When the arch dam is subjected to earthquake excitation, the contraction joints will open,close and slide, which have effect on the distribution of the stress in the dam. The shear keysof the contraction joints affect the seismic response of the arch dam, and different methods ofmodeling the shear keys have different effects.In this thesis, different contact models in ANSYS are used to simulate contraction jointsand the shear keys. The effects of the shear keys on the seismic response of high arch dam arestudied. The main parts are described as follows.1. The types and geometries of the contraction joints and shear kesy in the arch dam areintroduced. The approaches to solve frictional contact problems are briefly reviewed.2. Three joint models for contraction joints in which the effects and the shape of shearkeys are considered. The dynamic analysis of the dam with different contraction joint modelsare performed by finite element software ANSYS in which the nonlinear contact analysis isused.3. According to the results, the effects of different joint models on the dynamicresponse of arch dam are discussed. The results indicate the contraction joints have greatlyeffects on the stress distribution and magnitude of the arch dam and shear keys also haveeffect on the opening of the joints and slide along the joints.The conclusion derived from these results can provide some suggestions for thenumerically modeling of contraction joints.