Discharge of a silo through a lateral orifice: Role of the bottom inclination versus friction

Modified lateral pressure formula of shallow and circular silo considering the elasticities of silo wall and storage materials

For the shallow and circular silo (SCS), when the aspect ratio is between 1.0 and 1.5, the lateral pressure especially dynamic pressure may cause destruction if the size of the silo is large. This paper proposed a modified calculation method of lateral pressure on the silo wall of SCS, considering the elasticities of silo wall and storage materials. The availability of shallow silo and deep silo methods, and the modified method were compared with the experiment and simulation. The results show that the Rankine's formula is too conservative for the static lateral pressure, and the results of the modified method and Janssen formula are close to that of the experimental and simulation. For the dynamic lateral pressure calculation, Rankine theory is unsafe for the discharging load. The relative error of the dynamic lateral pressure based on Janssen theory is between 20 and 30%, which is too large. The dynamic lateral pressure calculated by the modified method is in good agreement with that of the experimental and simulation, and the relative error is less than 10%. Therefore, the modified method of lateral pressure formula is reasonable, which can provide guidance for the safety design of silo structure.

The effect of cohesion on the discharge of a granular material through the orifice of a silo

We present the results of both experimental and numerical investigations of the silo discharge for a cohesive granular material. In our study, thanks to a cohesion-controlled granular material (CCGM) we propose to investigate the effect of the cohesive length lc, on the discharge of a silo for two different configurations, one axisymmetrical, and one quasi-2D rectangular silo. In both configurations, an adjustable bottom is used to control the size of the orifice. As observed for cohesionless granular material by previous studies, the mass flow rate and the density through an orifice are mostly controlled by the diameter of the orifice D. The experimental results of the quasi-2D silo are compared with continuum numerical simulations.