Numerical study on the effects of opening form on the deflation for an air-supported membrane structure

Abstract

Air-supported membrane structure has been widely applied to large-span space due to its advantages of light weight, low cost, reusability. The static load bearing capacity and the dynamic deployment simulation of air-supported membrane structure have received extensive attention. However, very few studies have been reported to investigate its deflation behavior. Although several dynamic finite element algorithms can be applied to the deflation simulation, their computational costs are large. The concept of critical pressure point was introduced in this paper, by which the deflation process was divided into two stages of decompression and collapse. A series of numerical simulations were performed to study the effects of opening area and position on the pressure change in decompression process for air-supported membrane structure. The study showed that the required time for the critical pressure point reached initially decreases sharply gradually evolving into a slight decrease as the opening area increases from 0.5 to 6 m2, which followed a power equation as a function of opening area. Moreover, for a fixed opening area, opening position at top exhibits a minimum value followed by middle position, while a maximum value is shown when the opening is at bottom position. It is obviously that the decompression phase is affected significantly by the opening area and position. The above results have a certain meaning for safety assessment of personal evacuation under emergency deflation of the air-supported membrane structure.