Simulation of Sand Arching by Discrete Element Method

Abstract

The main objective of this work is the simulation of the sand arching contained in a container stuck using an implementation of the DEM that considers circular elements of variable size limited to 2D space. It is also studied the influence of roughness of the container wall on the arching. The studies of arching sand have application in different areas of knowledge such as civil engineering (foundations, design of silos), Petroleum Engineering (production of sand) and physics of granular materials.