Response of profiled barriers subject to hydrocarbon explosions

Abstract

This paper presents a numerical methodology to investigate the response of stainless steel profiled barriers when subjected to blast loading generated from a hydrocarbon explosion. Results from three large-scale explosion tests are used to validate the Abaqus/Explicit finite-element code adopted in the analyses. A simple failure algorithm based on equivalent plastic strain has been implemented in the numerical code to model the ductile weld tearing behaviour. The effects of strain rates, sensitivity of mesh densities and load idealisation will be discussed. A brief review of deep trough corrugated blastwalls that exhibit very different response behaviour will also be presented. The paper concludes with some parametric studies on load characteristics to determine the capacity of the deep trough corrugated blastwall.