This paper investigates the application of discrete exterior calculus (DEC) to predict the material performance of concrete (mortar and aggregates). The aim is to simulate the discrete and heterogenous structure of concrete directly to better predict local phenomena and their…
This paper investigates the application of discrete exterior calculus (DEC) to predict the material performance of concrete (mortar and aggregates). The aim is to simulate the discrete and heterogenous structure of concrete directly to better predict local phenomena and their impact on apparent global properties. Towards this goal, an existing DEC formulation of linear elasticity is ex- tended to describe incremental elastic-plastic material behavior with isotropic strain hardening. A Voronoi tessellation of the physical domain is used to represent different constituents of the concrete, where each cell is assigned a local material model and material properties. The interaction of the cells is described using the Delaunay dual tetrahedralization of the tessellation. Constructing the mesh in this order required a new boundary closure for the DEC formulation, which is also presented herein. The formulation is validated through simulation and compared to finite element analysis obtained from Abaqus. Simulations include compression of cubical specimens composed of 1) mortar with uniform properties and elastic-plastic response; 2) mortar, as before, but with different volume frac- tions of aggregate added, having purely elastic response; as well as 3) some initial simulations with the formation of cracks from specimens in tension. Excellent results are obtained when compared to the finite-element analysis, laying the foundation to simulate more complex phenomena in the future.