RESEARCH ARTICLE

Wei XIAO, Yunlong HE, Yanfeng ZHANG

Simplified analytical solution for free vibration characteristics
of Hardfill dam
E
Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag 2008
Abstract Formulas for computing natural frequencies
and modes of Hardfill dams are derived based on one-
dimensional shear wedge theory, in which the influences
of the upstream concrete face and hydrodynamic pressure
of water on the dams natural frequencies and modes are
discussed. Furthermore, the seismic responses of Hardfill
dams are calculated using response spectrum method. An
example is analyzed to compare the differences of natural
frequencies and modes between shear wedge method and
FEM. Then the applicability and accuracy of shear wedge
method to analyze free vibration characteristics of
Hardfill dams are proven.
Keywords shear wedge, natural frequency, mode, face,
hydrodynamic pressure
1 Introduction
Hardfill dam (called CSG dam in Japan) was put into
practice in recent years which is a new dam type between
traditional gravity dam and concrete face rockfill dam. It
is constructed to have lower cost and less impact on the
environment than other dams. The dam material is made
by mixing a certain percentage of cement and water with
material such as riverbed gravel or excavation muck
which can be obtained easily near the dam site. The dam
cross-section is trapezoidal, and its upstream side is cov-
ered with waterproof concrete face plate [1]. The surface
slopes of upstream and downstream are both about 1:0.7.
Because the height is so much smaller than the width of
the dam base, dam deformation under lateral (upstream -
downstream) earthquake is mainly shear deformation.
Compared with shear deformation, the bend deformation
is negligible. This conclusion has been demonstrated by
Japanese scholar Hirose [2], so calculating the traditional
shear wedge method used to analyze the seismic dynamic
responses of embankment dams is appropriate for deriv-
ing the lateral seismic dynamic response of Hardfill dams.
In recent years, shear wedge method has had significant
progress and improvement. 2D and 3D results of lateral,
longitudinal and vertical vibration have been published for
several idealized canyon shapes, such as rectangular, semi-
cylindrical, trapezoidal and triangular, and the inhomogen-
eous distribution of shear modulus is also taken into
account. Based on shear wedge method, wave motion-shear
wedge method and a modified equivalent linear technique
for analysis of seismic response of embankments are pre-
sented. Whats more, the shear wedge method is not only
used to calculate free vibration characteristics for earth
dams but also for CFRDs. The influences of concrete face
are discussed by additional mass and stiffness method when
the formulas for computing natural frequencies and modes
of CFRDs are derived, and the conclusion is verified by the
results of shaking table tests [314].
However, because the slopes of earth dams are so gen-
tle, the effect of hydrodynamic pressure is always ignored.
The effect of hydrodynamic pressure should be considered
for CFRDs because of the upstream concrete face and the
dams steeper slopes. The slope of Hardfill dam is about
1:0.5 to 1:0.8, which is much steeper than earth dams and
CFRDs, and there is concrete face on the upstream. Thus,
the influences of hydrodynamic pressure to natural fre-
quencies and modes should be considered, which are lar-
ger than those for earth dams and CFRDs. An equivalent
system is applied in this paper to calculate the influences
to amend the results by traditional shear wedge method.
The closed-form solutions for the lateral response of
Hardfill dams under empty and full storage are developed
based on the traditional shear wedge method. Results are
present for natural frequencies, modes and participation
factors. Hydrodynamic pressure is considered by addi-
tional mass method when free vibration characteristics
under full storage are analyzed.
Through one example, the reasonability and accuracy of
results by shear wedge method are evaluated by comparing
Received December 4, 2007; accepted May 26, 2008
Wei XIAO, Yunlong HE (*), Yanfeng ZHANG
State Key Laboratory of Water Resources and Hydropower
Engineering Science, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
E-mail: ylhe2002@yahoo.com.cn
Front. Archit. Civ. Eng. China 2008, 2(3): 219225
DOI 10.1007/s11709-008-0037-3
with the finite element numerical results. At last, it is con-
cluded that shear wedge method is appropriate in calculat-
ing seismic responses of Hardfill dams.
2 Analysis method
2.1 Shear wedge method (SWM)
The cross section of Hardfill dam is simplified into triangu-
lar section(Fig. 1), and the triangular vertices are on the
crest of the dam. Then the slopes are slightly changed so
that the area is equal to a trapezoidal section. As to high
dam, results with this simplification are the beginning of
getting the results by trapezoidal section because the height
of the dam is far less than the width of the dam base.
Some simplifying assumptions are still introduced with
shear wedge method.
1) Three-dimensional geometry of the Hardfill dam is
neglected when the dam axis is infinite long, and a plane
strain approximation is used.
2) The dam is modeled by uniform elastic material,
resting on a rigid foundation.
3) Only lateral shear deformation is allowed and
assumed to be uniformly distributed across the lateral
(upstream-downstream) direction of the dam under lat-
eral earthquake.
4) Hydrodynamic effect from the reservoir water is
taken into account.
If the hydrodynamic effect is ignored, considering the
dynamic equilibrium of an infinitesimal horizontal ele-
ment of the dam body and accounting for the stress-dis-
placement leads to the following equation
ar
C
zbr
H

L
2
u
Lt
2
~ aG
C
zbG
H

L
2
u
Lz
2
z bG
C
zmG
H

Lu
Lz
,
1
where a5a+bz is the lateral width of the concrete face,
b~
B
H
z~mz is the lateral width of the dam, u is the lateral
displacement relative to the boundaries. r, G and E are den-
sity, shear modulus andelastic modulus, andsubscript Cand
H respectively represent concrete and Hardfill material.
If the effect of concrete face is ignored, Eq. (1) may be
written as
L
2
u
Lt
2
~
G
H
r
H
L
2
u
Lz
2
z
G
H
zr
H
Lu
Lz
: 2
So when the effect of the concrete face plate is ignored,
the ith natural frequency v
i
and corresponding mode
shape W
i
are
v
i
~
b
i
H

G
H
r
H

, 3
W
i
~J
0
b
i
:
z
H
_ _
, 4
in which J
0
is the Bessel function of the first kind and
order zero, b
i
are the zeros of J
0
.
2.2 Effect of concrete face plate on free vibration
characteristics
Dv
i
,DW
i
respectively represent the influences of ith natural
frequency and mode shape function caused by mass matrix
and stiffness matrix of upstream concrete face plate, the
results have been presented by Kong Xianjing &Liu Jun [12]
2

G
H
r
H

b
i
H r
H
mzr
C
b HB
i
zr
C
aA
i
Dv
i
z

k
n~1
n=i
a
in
_
1
0
{G
H
m{G
C
b Hb
2
n
x
2
J
0
b
i
x J
0
b
n
x dx
_
zG
C
a
:
b
n
_
1
0
J
0
b
i
x J
1
b
n
x dx
z
_
1
0
r
H
mzr
C
b
G
H
r
H
Hb
2
i
x
2
J
0
b
i
x J
0
b
n
x dx
_
~{r
C
G
H
r
H
b
2
i
aA
i
zbB
i
H zG
C
bHb
2
i
B
i
{G
C
aC
i
, 5
2

G
H
r
H

r
H
mzr
C
b b
i
H
2
_
1
0
x
2
J
0
b
i
x J
0
b
j
x
_ _
dxDv
i
z

k
n~1
n=i
a
in
r
H
mzr
C
b
G
H
r
H
b
2
i
H{ G
H
mzG
C
b b
2
n
H
_ _ _
|
_
1
0
x
2
J
0
b
j
x
_ _
J
1
b
n
x dxzG
C
a
_
1
0
J
0
b
j
x
_ _
J
1
b
n
x dx
_
{ G
C
b
2
j
{r
C
G
H
r
H
b
2
i
_ _
aA
j
a
ij
~ G
C
{r
C
G
H
r
H
_ _
bb
2
i
H
_
1
0
x
2
J
0
b
j
x
_ _
J
0
b
j
x
_ _
dx
{G
C
a
:
b
i
_
1
0
J
0
b
j
x
_ _
J
1
b
i
x dx, 6
Fig. 1 Cross-section of Hardfill dam
220 Wei XIAO, et al.
Dv
i
and a
ij
can be obtained by solving the above sim-
ultaneous Eqs. (5) and (6). Then DW
i
is expressed as
DW
i
~

k
j~1
j=i
a
ij
W
j
: 7
In which
A
i
~J
2
1
b
i

_
2, B
i
~
_
1
0
x
2
J
2
0
b
i
x dx,
C
i
~0:5{b
2
i
A
i
, x~z=H:
8
2.3 Effect of hydrodynamic pressure on free vibration
characteristics
Eigenvalue l
i
is defined as
l
i
~v
2
i
: 9
There exist
K W
i
~l
i
M W
i
, 10
where [K], [M] is stiffness matrix and mass matrix of the
dam under empty storage, respectively.
Water is assumed to be incompressible without damp-
ing. Water vibration in the reservoir surface and vertical
displacement of the reservoir bottom are overlooked.
Then additional mass matrix caused by hydrodynamic
pressure can be obtained according to Westergaard solu-
tion.

Dl
i
p
and D

W
i
respectively present the change of
natural frequency and mode shape by the additional mass
matrix [DM] under full storage. Thus,
K W
i
zD

W
i
~ l
i
zDl
i
MzDM W
i
zD

W
i
: 11
Assume that D

W
i
is defined as
D

W
i
~

k
j~1
j=i
a
ij
W
j
: 12
That is
Dl
i
~{
W
T
i
DMW
i
W
T
i
MW
i
l
i
, 13
a
ij
~
l
i
lj{l
i
:
W
T
i
DMW
i
W
T
j
MW
j
: 14
As the results by shear wedge method are based on the
assumption that shear deformation is uniformly distribu-
ted in the lateral direction, so it is acceptable to represent
the dam as a one-dimensional particle system as Fig. 2
shows. The system is about K isometric points with the
spacing is l, mass is m
n
l~H=k, 15
m
n
~nr
H
mH
2
_
k
2
: 16
The additional mass applied on the points based on
Westergaard solution is
Dm
n
~7r
W
Hh
_
720
:

n=k
_
: 17
Then the mass matrix [M], additional mass matrix [DM]
and mode shape matrix [W
i
] of the equivalent system can
be given by
M~
r
H
mH
2
1
_
k
2
2
_
k
2
P
(k{1)
_
k
2
k
_
k
2
_

_
_

_
,
18
DM~
7r
W
hH
720

1=k
_

2=k
_
P

(k{1)=k
_

k=k
_
_

_
_

_
,
19
W
i
~
J
0
b
i
=k J
0
2b
i
=k . . . J
0
(k{1)b
i
=k J
0
kb
i
=k
T
:
20
Substituting Eqs. (13)(15) in Eqs. (17)(19) yields
Dl
i
~{
7r
W
h

k
n~1
J
2
0
nb
i
=k
:

n=k
_
720r
H
mH

k
n~1
n
:
J
2
0
nb
i
=k =k
2
l
i
, 21
Fig. 2 Equivalent system of dam
Simplified analytical solution for free vibration characteristics of Hardfill dam 221
D

W
i
~

k
j~1
j=i
l
i
l
j
{l
i
:
7r
W
h

k
n~1
J
2
0
nb
i
=k
:

n=k
_
720r
H
mH

k
n~1
n
:
J
2
0
nb
i
=k =k
2
W
j
: 22
Thus natural frequencies and mode shape functions under
full storage are given
v
0i
~v
i
zDvz

Dl
i
_
, W
0i
~W
i
zDW
i
zD

W
i
: 23
2.4 Seismic responses
Once the solutions of natural frequencies and mode shape
functions are given, the maximum seismic responses of the
dam, which are the most important for engineering, can be
derived by response spectrum method.
Maximum displacement:
d
i, max
~W
i
:
g
i
j jS
d,i
: 24
Maximum velocity:
v
i, max
~W
i
:
g
i
j jS
v,i
: 25
Maximum acceleration:
a
i, max
~W
i
:
g
i
j jS
a,i
: 26
In which g
i
is the participation factor defined by
g
i
~
_
H
0
W
0i
zdz
_
H
0
W
2
0i
zdz
: 27
S
d
, S
v
, S
a
respectively present relative displacement res-
ponse spectrum, relative velocity response spectrum and
absolute acceleration response spectrum. In general, the
first three to four maximum responses of the modes are
combined by SRRS method to get the maximum res-
ponses of the dam. For example, the maximum seismic
displacement is given by
d
max
~

4
i~1
d
2
i, max

_
: 28
3 Calculation example
A Hardfill dam is 50 m in height and 6 m in width of the
dam crest, and the upstream and downstream slopes are
both 1:0.7. The Hardfill material is assumed to be elastic,
and its properties are: mass density rH52200 kg/m
3
,
Youngs modulus E
H
52 GPa, Poissons ratio n
H
50.25
and those of the concrete face plate are: r
C
52400 kg/m
3
,
E
C
520 GPa, n
C
50.167.The width of the concrete face
plate increase as the depth like this:
a~0:3z0:00235z: 29
Three schemes are respectively calculated by SWM and
FEM to analyze the effects of upstream concrete face
plate and hydrodynamic pressure. Three schemes are
given in Table 1.
The first four natural frequencies and mode shapes of
the dam calculated by SWM and FEM are compared
under three schemes. Then the accuracy of SWM to ana-
lyze free vibration characteristics of Hardfill dams is illu-
strated (Table 2).
In general, the first four natural frequencies of the
three schemes are closer between SWM and FEM as
Table 2 shows. Results by SWM are a little higher than
FEM and the gap is almost within 10%.The effects of
concrete face plate and hydrodynamic pressure on nat-
ural frequencies are almost the same by SWM and
FEM. From Scheme 1 and Scheme 2, when the effect
of the face is considered, natural frequencies have dif-
ferent degrees of increase within 0.5% by SWM, and
the increase is a little larger by FEM. From Scheme 2
and Scheme 3, natural frequencies under full storage
have different degrees of decreases by 10%, which is
correct in analysis by SWM and FEM. In general, nat-
ural frequencies of the three schemes by SWM and
FEM have few discrepancies.
The first four modes by SWM and FEM are shown in
Fig. 3, and the effects of concrete face and hydrodynamic
pressure (Scheme 3) are considered. And the results by
FEM choose the mode displacement of the central axis
of the dam. From Fig. 3, it is observed that differences of
the first four modes by SWM and FEM are pretty small.
The differences of higher mode become larger between the
two methods.
The influence of concrete face on modes is much smaller
than natural frequencies. Because the ratio of concrete
Table 1 Three calculating schemes
effect of concrete face plate effect of hydrodynamic pressure
Scheme 1 ignored ignored
Scheme 2 considered ignored
Scheme 3 considered considered
Table 2 Frequencies of three schemes by SWM and FEM/Hz
Scheme 1 Scheme 2 Scheme 3
SWM FEM SWM FEM SWM FEM
1st 4.62 4.07 4.64 4.17 4.28 3.93
2nd 10.60 9.60 10.66 9.90 10.12 9.31
3rd 16.61 15.32 16.71 15.78 16.04 14.51
4th 22.63 21.38 22.75 21.85 21.97 19.55
222 Wei XIAO, et al.
and Hardfill material modulus is about 10, and effect of
the face can be neglected when we calculate free vibration
characteristics of Hardfill dams by SWM, which is con-
sistent with what Ref. [15] shows.
By comparing the first four natural frequencies and
modes of the two methods, a conclusion is obtained: the
free vibration characteristics of Hardfill dam can be cal-
culated by shear wedge method as accurately as finite
element method.
Once the free vibration characteristics are given by
shear wedge method, seismic responses including seismic
displacement, velocity and acceleration can be calculated
by response spectrum method. Quasi-velocity response
spectrum and velocity response spectrum have little dif-
ference for most earthquake movement that they can be
approximately equal
v
i
S
d,i
~S
pv,i
~
1
v
i
S
a,i
&S
v,i
: 30
Standard response spectrum in Specifications for
seismic design of hydraulic structures(SL 20397) is
applied [16]. The maximum value of the spectrum,
characteristic period of the court and the largest lateral
acceleration are 2.0, 0.2 s and 1.96 m/s
2
. Acceleration
response spectrum of the dam can be obtained in
accordance with natural periods. Then velocity res-
ponse spectrum and displacement response spectrum
can be calculated by Eq. (30). The maximum lateral
seismic response is calculated by SRRS method in the
final.
The distributions of seismic displacement, velocity and
acceleration of the Hardfill dam by response spectrum
method are shown in Fig. 4. Responses increase along
the dam height and the maximum values all appear on
the top of the dam. Distribution of seismic velocity by
SWM is absolutely consistent with those by FEM. The
differences of seismic displacement and acceleration
between SWM and FEM become larger along the dam
height. Largest gaps between the two methods are
0.792 mm and 1.49 m/s
2
, which occur on the dam crest.
Below half of the dam height, distributions of seismic
acceleration by SWM and FEM are almost the same.
Generally speaking, seismic responses by SWM and
FEM are appropriate.
Through comparison of natural frequencies, modes and
seismic responses between shear wedge method and finite
element method, shear wedge method is appropriate for
use in seismic design of Hardfill dams.
Fig. 3 First four mode shapes of Scheme 3 by SWM and FEM
Simplified analytical solution for free vibration characteristics of Hardfill dam 223
4 Conclusions
Nowadays, computer technology and finite element
method have had much development. However, there is
still superiority of shear wedge method. It is particularly
suitable for feasibility study at comparative stage because
its simpler to calculate acceleration distribution along the
height of the dam.
The closed-form natural frequencies and modes for-
mulas of Hardfill dams are derived in this paper based
on one-dimensional shear wedge theory. Then the effects
of concrete face and hydrodynamic pressure of water in
the reservoir on the free vibration characteristics of the
dam are studied: natural frequencies have some reduction
caused by water and have a little increase by concrete face.
The differences of natural frequencies between SWM
and FEM are within 10%. And the differences of modes
are much smaller than natural frequencies between the
two methods. Furthermore, seismic responses of
Hardfill dams including seismic displacement, velocity
and acceleration are calculated using response spectrum
method by SWM and FEM. The distributions of these
seismic responses along the dam height by SWM are close
to results by FEM.
In general, shear wedge method is accurate and reliable
for calculating free vibration characteristics and seismic res-
ponses of Hardfill dams. The distribution laws of the seis-
mic responses are helpful for the design of Hardfill dams.
Acknowledgements This study was supported by the National Natural
Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 50679058).
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Simplified analytical solution for free vibration characteristics of Hardfill dam 225