PENETRATION OF PLATES IN DENSE SNOW.

• Main Authors: Mellor,Malcolm, ramseier,Rene O.
• Other Authors: COLD REGIONS RESEARCH AND ENGINEERING LAB HANOVER N H
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 1965
• Subjects: (*SNOW; FOUNDATIONS(STRUCTURES)); (*FOUNDATIONS(STRUCTURES); SNOW); MECHANICAL PROPERTIES; SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH; THEORY; MATHEMATICAL ANALYSIS; VISCOELASTICITY; ELASTIC PROPERTIES; METAL PLATES; PENETRATION; DEFORMATION; LOADS(FORCES); STRESSES; SHEAR STRESSES; STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS; STRENGTH(PHYSIOLOGY); POLAR REGIONS; Greenland; Kerr; Ice cap
• Online Access: http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/AD0617617; http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=AD0617617

As part of a program of snow studies in Greenland, instrumented struts were placed in rooms excavated below the surface of the ice cap. Closure rates were measured in the undersnow cavities, and strut loads developed by snow pressure on the circular end plates were recorded. The strut installations are described and the data are interpreted in terms of Kerr's viscous foundation theory. Emphasis is placed on the penetration of a circular rigid plate, the evaluation of the viscosity coefficients, comments on the values of the parameters for a given material, shear viscosity, and thickness in the Kerr model, and the effect of plate size on penetration rate. It is tentatively concluded that (1) until a suitable treatment for the viscoelastic continuum becomes available, the Kerr model offers a rational approach to problems of foundations in snow and to certain problems involving pressures on undersnow structures, (2) the viscosity coefficients of the model are not in themselves characteristic constants for a given snow, (3) as a consequence of (2), the viscosity coefficients may not be evaluated by comparing data for plates of widely differing sizes, and (4) if the thickness coefficient were found to be independent of plate size, as seems possible, it would become a valuable index for determining size effect. (Author)