Numerical Simulation of a Soil Model-Model Container-Centrifuge Shaking Table System

A numerical model is developed using OpenSees to represent the dynamics of a soil model-model container-centrifuge shaking table system. The centrifuge shaker-system includes soil model, the flexible shear beam model container, shaking table and its reaction mass. All of these different components interact with the soil model during dynamic excitation, with some absorbing energy and others allowing undesired modes to affect the response observed in the experiment. This interaction of soil model and centrifuge/actuation system might attenuate or amplify the discrepancies in the responses of the numerical and physical models. The relative error between a numerical simulation and a physical simulation depends on how the boundary conditions and interaction among different components in the physical model are included in the numerical model. Assessment of the quality of a comparison between a numerical and physical simulation should account for the effects of the boundary conditions and dynamic interaction among different components in the dynamic system. This paper outlines the details of the simulation model, presents some representative results from simulations, discusses the effect of interaction among different components on the responses, and presents how the sensitivity of simulation outputs to uncertainties in the material properties depends on boundary conditions in the physical and numerical simulations.