Discontinuous deformation analysis enriched by the bonding block model

Abstract

The discontinuous deformation analysis (DDA) has been extensively applied in geotechnical engineering owing to its salient merits in the modeling of discontinuities. However, this method assumes a constant stress field within every block and hence cannot provide reliable estimation for block deformations and stresses. This paper proposes a novel scheme to improve the accuracy of the DDA. In our method, advanced subdivision is introduced to represent a block as an assembly of triangular or quadrilateral elements, in which overlapped element edges are separated from each other and are glued together by bonding springs. The accuracy and the effectiveness of the proposed method are illustrated by three numerical experiments for both continuous and discontinuous problems.