Assignment 1 - 2014

This is a group assignment

The title should list all group members.

The report should include the full justifications of your solutions, the programs developed and full
references to the sources you used.

Submission by 30 August 2013

Resubmission by 9 September
Marking scheme
If the submitted assignment is perfect (no mistakes) the group receives 100%, otherwise the
assignment must be improved and resubmitted.
If the resubmitted assignment is perfect (no mistakes) the group receives 70%.
If the resubmitted assignment is not perfect, the group receives 0%.

1 Stress rotation. Friction

A block contains a fracture inclined at α=40o, with respect to the horizontal and holds on friction,
Fig. 1. The block is loaded by stress px=70MPa, py=70MPa, pz=8MPa. Determine if sliding can
occur over the fracture. In order to do this, develop a Matlab program to determine the possibility
of sliding for any values of stress, angle of inclination and friction coefficient. Use the friction law

τ max = c + µσ N (1)

where τmax is the maximum shear stress in the plane of the fracture, σN is the normal stress acting
on the fracture plane. For the particular calculations to be reported, the values of the parameters c
and µ (the cohesion and friction coefficient, respectively) should be obtained from the appropriate
literature. For illustration, use aluminium over aluminium (Mechanical and Chemical and other
streams) or granite over granite (Civil, Mining and Environmental).

In your report please explain the theory behind your algorithm with the reference to the
corresponding slides in the lecture notes.
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Notes. 1. If there are several values suggested use an average one. If the group consists of students
from both, Mechanical/Chemical and Civil/Mining/Environmental you can choose any.
2. The cohesion can in some cases be zero. In all cases you need to justify your choice of
parameters c and µ by properly referring to the source (e.g. handbook).

pz
z
px

py py

α" y

x p
x
pz
Fig. 1 Block with fracture under compressive loading.

2 Determination of thickness of two layers. Linear model (Use Matlab for computations.)

A wall made of steel developed two external damaged layers: an external heavily damaged layer of
thickness d2 and a less damaged layer of thickness d1 (see Fig. 2). The total wall thickness is L. The
thicknesses of the damaged layers are not known. In order to determine the thicknesses without
disrupting the wall operation, ultrasonic measurements are conducted by placing the transmitter of
acoustic pulses at point A and the receiver at point B and measuring times tp and ts needed for the p
(pressure) wave and s (sear) wave to traverse the wall.
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The aim of this question is to construct a linear model (a set of linear equations) for the
determination of the unknown thicknesses. Do it in the following steps.

1. Model formulation. Suppose the thicknesses, d1 and d2 of the damaged layers are known.
Write the equations to determine the times tp and ts needed for p and s waves to cross the
wall. Assume that the total wall thickness, L, is known as well as the p - and s wave
velocities: c0p , c1p , c2p , c0s , c1s , c2s of each layer and the undamaged material, see Fig. 2.
2. Test example. Suppose you know the thicknesses of the layers: d1 =2 mm and d2=1 mm.
Determine the times tp and ts needed for p and s waves to traverse the wall. Assume L=10
mm,
c0p = 5 km / sec
c1p = 4.45721093750000 km / sec
c2p = 4.68033845625000 km / sec
c0s = 3.125 km / sec
c1s = 1.61766128656250 km / sec
c2s = 2.05351933062500 km / sec
3. Model calibration. Suppose now that tp and ts are known. Determine the thicknesses from
the model built in step 1. Check that they coincide with the values for the thicknesses
assumed in step 2.
4. Model analysis. Suppose that the measurements of the times are conducted with small
errors: the value measured for tp is 0.1% lower than the one obtained in step 2, while ts is
0.2% higher than the one obtained in step 2. Determine the layer thicknesses with these
slightly incorrect values for the times and find the error in the thickness determination. Use:
(a) Gaussian Eliminations, (b) Method of inverse matrix, (c) Method of simple iterations
(method Jacobi) and (d) Gauss-Seidel method of iterations. For methods of iterations please
use tolerance (error) of 10-6. Please comment on how many iterations required in both
methods to achieve the tolerance specified. Analyse the results: check how different they
are from the thicknesses assumed in step 2. Are the results obtained by different methods of
solving the system of linear equations the same? Explain the findings (hint: check the
condition number).
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5. Improvement of the method. Suppose you conduct 10 measurements with random errors,
independently and uniformly distributed within the interval (-0.2%, 0.2%) and then average
the result. Has it improved? How many measurements need to be conducted to achieve
10% accuracy?

z
Transducer'
Receiver'
c0p c1p c2p
A c0s c1s c2s B
d1 d2 x

L
Fig. 2. Schematics of ultrasonic measurements of layer thicknesses.

3 Different thicknesses of the combined damaged layer at different points – interpolation

1. Damaged layers do not usually have uniform thickness. Through the acoustic
measurements (from question 2) the values for the total thickness (d=d1+d2) were found at
different points along the z-axis, Fig. 2. These values are listed in Table 1. Using these
points find the functional dependence d(z) using (a) polynomial interpolation, (b) cubic
spline interpolation and (3) the best fit quadratic polynomial using the least squares
method. Use Matlab for computations.
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Table 1. Values of the combined thickness of the damaged zone for different values of z.
z, mm 0 10 20 30 40 50 60
d, mm 3 3.2 2.1 3.8 4 4.3 3.7

4 Determine whether the sliding can occur at a point of the boundary of the damaged zone

Assume that the boundary between the damaged zone and the intact material is held on friction.
Determine whether sliding can occur at a certain point of the boundary producing a defect. Do it in
the following steps:
1. Determine the slope at point z* =45 mm for the case when the boundary is given by Table 1
and for all three approximations found in question 3: the polynomial interpolation, spline
interpolation and the quadratic polynomial found by the least squares method. For the case
when the boundary is given analytically (by the interpolating formulas) use analytical
differentiation. For the boundary given by Table 1, use the finite difference:

d(zi+1 ) − d(zi )
d !(z ∗ ) ≈ (2)
zi+1 − zi

where zi is the point from Table 1 before the point z*.

2. Determine, using the program developed in Question 1 whether the sliding is going to
occur. In order to do this, work out how to calculate the angle inclination of the boundary
from the value of the slope. (Note, be careful in determining the direction of the inclination
and hence the sign the angle.) Use the load from Fig. 1, friction law (1) and cohesion and
friction coefficient for steel over steel.

5 Write a short essay (1 page) on the history of matrices