Durability of Stress Ribbon Bridge Checked during Loading Test

Stress ribbon bridges have many advantages and became recently more popular mostly because of their versatile form, slender decks giving a light aesthetic impression and durability assured by post tensioned concrete. The paper presents the first in Poland stress Ribbon Bridge constructed last year. A static and dynamic analyse of the model is presented as well as construction solutions which were used to achieve the highest durability. The bridge was checked during static and dynamic load test. The results of this prove test were compared with results obtained from examination and study of other different bridge structures. It confirmed that the bridge has good dynamic resistance and greater stiffness than assumed in the design.     

三官汉江矮塔斜拉桥索塔节段模型试验研究

通过有限元分析与索塔模型试验相结合的方法,对武汉市三官汉江公路矮塔斜拉桥索的塔锚固区进行受力分析及验证索塔锚固区带单侧双向抗滑装置的静载抗滑性能研究,通过试验模拟实桥运营阶段的单根钢绞线换索过程,为设计和施工提供技术支持。试验结果表明,该桥索塔锚固区结构受力安全、索塔锚固区抗滑构造及单根钢绞线换索工艺满足设计和规范要求。     

Response of Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) to stress induced by different types of pollutants – testing the fluctuating asymmetry

Damage caused to pine forests by industrial pollution is observed even several decades after emissions have stopped down. A simple morphological feature – the leaf fluctuating asymmetry – was used for assessing the condition of Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) stands growing in a heavily degraded area. In 2011, a study was performed on the developmental instability of needles in four naturally reforested Polish populations of P. sylvestris. Studies were conducted within the protective zone at a zinc smelter, a copper smelter, a cement plant and train tracks. All selected areas manifested a high extent of anthropogenic pollution‐induced environmental degradation until the end of the 90s. Currently, a reduced level of environmental pollution is recorded at these sites. Control group was a natural population of Scots pine from the region of National Park of Wielkopolska. The results confirm the usefulness of fluctuating asymmetry as a highly sensitive indicator of non‐specific stress. Also, it was shown that in areas degraded by human activity, poor condition of Scots pine persists that the stress factor has been eliminated. This tendency occurs particularly to areas contaminated by heavy metals.     

Stability analysis of layered slopes in unsaturated soils

This study presents stability analyses of layered soil slopes in unsaturated conditions and uses a limit equilibrium method to determine the factor of safety involving suction stress of unsaturated soil. One-dimensional steady infiltration and evaporation conditions are considered in the stability analyses. An example of a two-layered slope in clay and silt is selected to verify the used method by comparing with the results of other methods. Parametric analyses are conducted to explore the influences of the matric suction on the stability of layered soil slopes. The obtained results show that larger suction stress provided in unsaturated clay dominates the stability of the layered slopes. Therefore, the location and thickness of the clay layer have significant influences on slope stability. As the water level decreases, the factor of safety reduces and then increases gradually in most cases. Infiltration/evaporation can obviously affect the stability of unsaturated layered slopes, but their influences depend on the soil property and thickness of the lower soil layer.     

Structural form-finding of bending components in buildings by using parametric tools and principal stress lines

This paper aims to provide an efficient and straightforward structural form-finding method for designers to extrapolate component forms during the conceptual stage. The core idea is to optimize the classical method of structural form-finding based on principal stress lines by using parametric tools. The traditional operating process of this method relies excessively on the designer's engineering experience and lacks precision. Meanwhile, the current optimization work for this method is overly complicated for architects, and limitations in component type and final result exist. Therefore, to facilitate an architect's conceptual work, the optimization metrics of the method in this paper are set as simplicity, practicality, freedom, and rapid feedback. For that reason, this paper optimizes the method from three aspects: modeling strategy for continuum structures, classification processing of data by using the k-nearest neighbor algorithm, and topological form-finding process based on stress lines. Eventually, it allows architects to create structural texture with formal aesthetics and modify it in real time on the basis of structural analysis results. This paper also explores a comprehensive application strategy with internal force analysis diagramming to form-finding. The finite element analysis tool Karamba3D verifies the structural performance of the form-finding method. The performance is compared with that of the conventional form, and the comparison results show the practicality and potential of the strategy in this paper.     

Application of the Electrodiffusion Method to Measure Wall Shear Stress: Integrating Theory and Practice

The electrodiffusion method has been used in fluid dynamic research for the past 50 years. It allows the measurement of wall shear stress, a crucial parameter, e.g., for the cleaning of membrane modules used in water filtration. Various authors have published articles dealing with the theory behind this technique. But no paper collects all the knowledge assembled over five decades of application. Here, comprehensive summary of the theory of steady flow, unsteady flow, and transient voltage step experiments is given. Factors influencing the accuracy of the measurements are discussed. Furthermore, a new approach to calibrate the system from voltage step experiments is introduced, and practical issues related to its application in flow measurements are discussed for an exemplary signal response to a near‐wall flow.     

The effects of etching and deposition on the performance and stress evolution of open through silicon vias

The effects of silicon etching using the Bosch process and LPCVD oxide deposition on the performance of open TSVs are analyzed through simulation. Using an in-house process simulator, a structure is generated which contains scalloped sidewalls as a result of the Bosch etch process. During the LPCVD deposition step, oxide is expected to be thinner at the trench bottom when compared to the top; however, additional localized thinning is observed around each scallop. The scalloped structure is compared to a structure where the etching step is not performed, but rather a flat trench profile is assumed. Both structures are imported into a finite element tool in order to analyze the effects of processing on device performance. The scalloped structure is shown to have an increased resistance and capacitance when compared to the flat TSV. Additionally, the scalloped TSV does not perform as well at high frequencies, where the signal loss is shown to increase. However, the scallops allow the TSV to respond better to an applied stress. This is due to the scallops’ enhanced range of motion and displacement, meaning they can compensate for the stress along the entire sidewall and not only on the TSV top, as in the flat structure.     

Mechanical behavior of interlocking multi-stepped double scarf adhesive joints including void and disbond effects

Surface topographical effects on the mechanical behavior of interlocking multi-stepped double scarf adhesive joints under tensile load were studied. For this purpose, finite element analysis (FEA) of the joint geometry at 10 different step angles was carried out. In the second stage, the effects of substrate voids and adhesive delaminations on the interfacial strength were studied for the scarf angle of 32.2° by FEA simulation as well as experimentally. For the cases of the missing steps (voids) and delamination (absence of bonding induced by release agent) the ratios of maximum stresses (principal, von Mises, normal, shear and transverse) between the completely bonded and altered (void or delaminated) joints were compared with the failure load ratios for the same joints to interpret the mechanism of failure. The results revealed that except for the normal stress, the maximum stress ratios reach a maximum value and then decrease with increasing scarf angle. FEA analysis with the voids showed that the strength of the joint not only depends on their size, but also on their location in the joint. When the experimental results were compared with the FEA using the stress ratio between the unmodified (completely bonded) and modified (void or disbond) cases, the results indicated that the normal stress dominates the failure behavior of the 32.2° scarf angle joint. Comparison of the experimental results for the void, and disbond cases revealed that the disbond cases can possess higher joint strength in comparison to the void cases. This finding could not be predicted by FEA, and was attributed to the presence of friction at the interface subsequent to delamination.     

Behavior and mechanism of the stress buffer effect of the inside ceramic layer to the top ceramic layer in a double-ceramic-layer thermal barrier coating

The Double-Ceramic-Layer Thermal Barrier Coating (DCL-TBC) consists of a top ceramic layer (TC1), an inside ceramic layer (TC2), bond coat (BC) and alloy substrate. The top ceramic layer is made by new ceramic materials which has the lower thermal conductivity, such as LZ, LZ₇C₃, LMA etc. Although these materials have good high temperature performance and thermal insulation properties, their thermal expansion coefficients are very low which cause higher degree of mismatch with material properties of alloy substrate.     

Vacancy strengthening in Fe3Al iron aluminides

The room temperature strength of FeAl alloys can be increased significantly by freezing in the high thermal vacancy concentrations present at elevated temperatures. In contrast, because of their lower thermal vacancy concentrations, vacancy strengthening in quenched Fe₃Al alloys is believed to be much smaller and has not received much attention to date. In the present work, the influence of annealing time and quench temperature on the room temperature strength of extruded and recrystallized Fe₃Al alloys is evaluated. For aluminum concentrations between 28 and 32 at% and quench temperatures between 400 and 900 °C both the magnitude and the kinetics of strengthening are found to be consistent with reported values for the thermal vacancy concentrations and vacancy migration rates. To assess the potential contributions of other strengthening mechanisms, appropriate heat treatments will need to be designed in follow-on studies that alter microstructural features relevant to those mechanisms while maintaining a constant vacancy concentration.