Experimental and mesoscopic investigation on the dynamic properties of coral aggregate concrete in compression

To investigate the dynamic responses and comprehending the damage mechanism of coral aggregate concrete (CAC) in compression, both the experimental and numerical investigations were implemented in the present work. Firstly, the dynamic mechanical properties of CAC at different strain rates were tested through the Split-Hopkinson pressure bar (SHPB) tests. Moreover, the effects of concrete strength grade and strain rate on CAC were discussed and analyzed. Subsequently, we developed the three-dimensional (3D) random mesoscale model considering the randomness of aggregate shape, size and distribution at meso-level, which was validated and employed in the numerical simulation of CAC in compression. The results indicate that the splitting failure passing through the coral aggregate is CAC'S primary failure mode. It has been found that the failure pattern, deformation process, and dynamic increasing factor of CAC are associated with both the strain rate and concrete strength grade. Furthermore, by comparing the experimental and mesoscopic results, it has been proven to be reliable to employ the developed 3D mesoscale modelling method to simulate CAC's dynamic performances, which has enormous potential in future research of CAC under intense dynamic loadings.