A hybrid rigid-body rotation model with sliding for calculating the response of a temporary soil-filled wall subjected to blast loading

Abstract

The objective of this study is to provide an efficient analytical model to calculate a time history of impulsive response for a free-standing soil-filled HESCO Bastian concertainer ® wall subjected to a known air blast loading, and to improve upon the formulation of a hybrid rigid-body rotation model previously published. The earlier model did not take into account sliding, which occurs for HB walls filled with cohesive soils. Any lateral movement along the base of the wall was assumed to result entirely from shear deformation. In this paper, the sliding effect is derived and incorporated into the model. The formulation of this proposed hybrid rigid-body rotation model with sliding is presented in detail. The time histories of horizontal and vertical displacements calculated from the proposed analytical model are validated with results from full-scale blast testing of free-standing simple straight walls and calculations using a finite element model for both cohesive and cohesionless soil properties. A sensitivity study was conducted to test the model’s response to different soil parameters by comparing the finite element model and proposed analytical model. The proposed analytical model predicts changes in displacement–time histories of similar magnitudes compared with those predicted by the finite element model, showing that the proposed analytical model’s response correctly considers changes in response occurring from differing soil parameters. Height-to-width ratios are presented for its range of validity.