Experimental Study on Vertical Ice Loads Acting on Pile Structures with a Circular Cross-Section

摘要

When ice sheets adfreeze to structures with a circular cross-section, vertical ice loads act on them as the water level changes due to the tides. The ice loads on structures grow greater with increased changes in water level. However, when the change in water level reaches a certain degree, the ice sheets fracture. The modes of failure are classified roughly as bending failure and adfreeze bond failure whereby the ice sheet is exfoliated from the surface of the structure. Furthermore, bending failure can be subdivided into two forms of cracking: radial cracking and circumferential cracking. We developed theoretical equations to estimate the vertical ice loads, which correspond to each mode of failure, and verified the equations through field experiments although only a limited number of experiments were performed in this research.