Many dams existing today were constructed around fifty years ago. Condition monitoring is essential for maintaining high safety and determining the current level of safety and stability for these dams. There is a need for new monitoring techniques and finite element coupled monitoring could be one of these techniques.
A concrete arch dam located in Sweden is modelled and calibrated with respect to concrete temperature measurements. The temperature distribution is then defined as a prescribed strain in a structural mechanical model in which a parametric study is performed.
The results from the parametric study are compared to measurements of the crest deformation and a combination of parameters is found giving the lowest difference between measurements and model results for the mid-section. The results show that the finite element model can be used to predict the behavior of the dam with acceptable deviation. The parametric study indicates that the reference temperature of the concrete has little effect on the amplitude of the deformation and that the governing factor is the coefficient of thermal expansion.
Source: KTH
Author: Andersson, Oskar | Seppälä, Max