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Model Experiments to Determine Ice Forces on Conical Structures

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 February 2018

R. Y. Edwards
Affiliation:
Arctec Canada, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
K. R. Croasdale
Affiliation:
Imperial Oil Ltd., Calgary, Alberta, Canada
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Abstract

Reduced-scale experiments were conducted in 1971 to study the forces experienced by conical structures during encounters with uniformly thick fields of ice. The tests were conducted in a model basin which was designed to test the behavior of ships and floating platforms in ice. A liquid nitrogen spray system was used to produce fields of high-salinity, fine-crystalline, ice which has the properties of elastic modulus and strength scaled down substantially below full-scale values.

Type
Abstracts of Papers Presented at the Symposium but not Published in Full in this Volume
Copyright
Copyright © International Glaciological Society 1977

Models representing conical-shaped structures to 1/50 and 1/100 scale were mounted onto a three-component load transducer which was fixed to a towing carriage. A total of 20 tests were conducted during which 45° cones of diameter 25 cm, 50 cm, and l00 cm were moved through uniform ice with thicknesses in the range 1.9 to 6.8 cm. Ice strength (in flexure) varied in the range 0.01 to 0.41 bar. Enough data were collected to derive a first approximation to an empirical solution for the forces exerted against a cone as a function of ice thickness h, flexural strength σf, and cone diameter D. The small-scale tests results were compared with one current mathematical model and found to predict higher values of horizontal force than the mathematical model.