Particle modeling of dynamic fragmentation—II: Fracture in single- and multi-phase materials

The second paper of this series adopts particle modeling (PM) to simulation of dynamic fracture phenomena in homogeneous and heterogeneous materials, such as encountered in comminution and blasting processes in mining industry. As the basis for such simulations, we first develop a new method to prevent particles from topologically interpenetrating themselves within the material domain, when actual fracture does not actually take place. We then move to a number of application studies: (i) fragmentation of 2-D single- and multi-phase materials—including a simulation of a drop-weight test—and (ii) fragmentation of 3-D single-phase materials under either very rapid extension or compression. These investigations show patterns and trends of fragmentation of materials in function of their constitutive properties, their geometric shapes, and the loading conditions.