Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Cement and Concrete Research

journal homepage: http://ees.elsevier.com/CEMCON/default.asp

Experimental confirmation of some factors influencing dynamic

concrete compressive strengths in high-speed impact tests
Y. Hao a,b,⁎, H. Hao a,b, G.P. Jiang c, Y. Zhou c
a
Tianjin University and The University of Western Australia Joint Research Center of Protective Structures, Tianjin, China
b
School of Civil and Resource Engineering, The University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia
c
School of Civil Engineering, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou, China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper reports probably the first systematic experimental investigation of the influences of lateral inertia
Received 13 December 2012 confinement, end friction confinement and aggregates in high-speed impact tests on dynamic compressive prop-
Accepted 10 May 2013 erties of concrete. The influences of the concerned factors on the dynamic increase factor (DIF) are discussed. The
proposed DIF relations in Hao and Hao [36] are verified by the experimental data in this study. The results con-
Keywords:
firm the observations made before based on numerical simulations that lateral inertia confinement effect is de-
Concrete (E)
Lateral inertia (B)
pendent on the specimen diameter and strain rate. The influences of aggregate size and volume to DIF are
End friction (B) considerable, and aggregates cannot be neglected in experimental or numerical studies. It also confirms that
Aggregate (D) the end friction confinement effect is sensitive to the specimen geometry and strain rate. The equation proposed
High strain rate in Hao et al. [40] based on numerical simulations satisfactorily removes the friction confinement effect on the DIF
of concrete material strength obtained in impact test.
© 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Concrete materials have been widely used in constructions of pro-
tective structures. For reliable design and modelling of concrete struc-
tures against high rate loadings such as blast and impact, it is essential
and critical to understand the dynamic properties of concrete material.
The dynamic compressive strength of concrete material is usually
obtained by conducting laboratory tests such as split Hopkinson pres-
sure bar (SHPB) tests [1], drop-weight tests [2] or tests with other testing
techniques [3], among which the SHPB technique has become one of the
most commonly used approaches to test the dynamic properties of ma-
terials [4]. The schematic show of a typical SHPB test set-up is illustrated
in Fig. 1, where the specimen is sandwiched between two pressure bars.
When the striker bar impacts the incident bar, a one-dimensional com-
pressive stress wave is generated. The stress wave propagates along
the incident bar towards the specimen and is recorded by gauge A.
When it reaches the interface between the incident bar and the speci-
men, part of it reflects as a tensile stress wave while the rest travels
through the specimen. Reflecting at the two interfaces, part of the stress
wave in the specimen goes back and forth and makes the stress along the
specimen approximately uniform after a few reflections. The compres-
sive stress wave leaves the specimen, propagates forward along the
transmission bar and is recorded by gauge B [5].
⁎ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: hao.yifei@outlook.com (Y. Hao).
A large number of laboratory tests have indicated that the dynamic
strength of concrete material is comparatively higher than its corre-
sponding static strength [6–16]. The dynamic increase factor (DIF), de-
fined as the ratio of dynamic-to-static strength, is conventionally
considered as a material property, which is proposed to be used in de-
sign and analysis of concrete structures against dynamic loadings, to
make such phenomenon simply applicable to engineering practice.
Based primarily on test data from experimental studies, many empirical
DIF relations with respect to strain rates are available in the literature
for compression [3,8,17,18] and tension [11,17,19,20]. Some codes of
practice such as Comité Euro-International du Béton (CEB) also give
recommendations of concrete material DIF that can be used in the
design and analysis [21].
However, it has been noticed that although all test data from different
tests on concrete material follow a similar trend, i.e. DIF increases with
the strain rate, significant scatters of the DIF data are observed [19,22],
which can be partially attributed to variations in testing conditions
such as equipment, specimen and material. Besides these variations, it
is well acknowledged that rather than reflecting the real material proper-
ty, the structural effects generated during the high-speed impact might
also have significant influences on the test results. Bischoff and Perry
conducted a critical review and discussion on the possible influencing
factors on the compressive behaviour of concrete material under impact
loads [23]. Since then many researches, mainly numerical based, have
been carried out for a more comprehensive understanding of the various
structural effects influencing the results of impact tests, and some contro-
versial conclusions have been drawn which are summarized below.

0008-8846/$ – see front matter © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cemconres.2013.05.008
64 Y. Hao et al. / Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70
Fig. 1. Configuration of SHPB test.
1.1. Lateral inertia confinement
One of the primary concerns and most intensively studied influ-
encing factors in dynamic material testing is the lateral inertia con-
finement. It is well known that concrete material is sensitive to the
confining pressure, i.e. the quasi-static strength of concrete material
increases with the confining pressure. Under high-speed impact load-
ings, due to the Poisson's effect, the specimen inevitably undergoes
lateral deformation. The lateral deformation results in backward iner-
tia force as a confinement to limit the deformation, shown in Fig. 2,
which is known as the lateral inertia confinement. Whether the later-
al inertia confinement affects results from tests and how significant
its influence is are under hot debate. The influence of lateral inertia
confinement on dynamic compressive strength of concrete materials
has been widely discussed by many researchers. However, different
points of views have been made. Based on the premise that the lateral
inertia confinement does affect the testing results, Le Nard and Bailly
believed that the increase in dynamic uniaxial strength is mainly
attributed to the inertia confinement according to their numerical
studies. In other words, the DIF is not a material property, but caused
by the inertia force owing to the structural effect [24]. Cotsovos and
Pavlović conducted numerical simulations of impact tests on concrete-
like materials and also concluded that DIF obtained from dynamic test-
ing is caused primarily by lateral inertia confinement [25]. Rather than
reflecting the dynamic material property, the obtained DIF is more like-
ly a structural effect. According to these observations, the dynamic test-
ing of concrete specimens cannot be used to determine the concrete
dynamic material properties. The practice of using laboratory test re-
sults to derive constitutive relations of concrete behaviour under dy-
namic loadings is thus misleading [25]. If the observation is true, that
the observed DIF in dynamic tests is only a structural effect caused by
inertia confinement, but not a material property, using DIF in numerical
modelling of structure response to blast and impact load, as it is com-
monly done in practice, will lead to an overestimate of the material
strength.
On the other hand, based on an assumption that the specimen defor-
mation is uniform, Tang et al. carried out analytical estimations of the
lateral inertia confinement in a homogenized cylindrical concrete spec-
imen in an SHPB test, and concluded that the effect of the lateral inertia
confinement on SHPB test was insignificant and could be ignored [26].
Other researchers acknowledge the contribution of lateral inertia con-
finement effect on DIF, but do not rule out the material strength incre-
ment at high strain rate. For example, Huang and Subhash carried out
Fig. 2. Lateral inertia and end friction confinements in high-speed impact tests on concrete material.
numerical simulations of impact tests and observed the significant con-
tribution of the lateral inertia confinement [27]. Bertholf and Karnes
performed numerical simulations and indicated that the lateral and
axial inertia and friction could produce additional constraints and result
in multi-axial stress states. They also suggested an optimal aspect ratio
L/D (length to diameter) of 0.5 to design SHPB specimens to eliminate
the axial inertia [28]. Li and his co-workers performed a series of nu-
merical and experimental studies of SHPB test on the compressive
strength of mortar or concrete-like materials and concluded that signif-
icant lateral inertia confinement occurs only when the strain rate ex-
ceeds 200/s [29–31]. This has been further supported by the numerical
simulations carried out by Hao and Hao on rock materials [32]. Based
on numerical simulation results, revised DIF relations of mortar matrix
and aggregate were proposed with the influence of lateral inertia con-
finement removed [36].
1.2. Contribution of aggregates
It is noticeable that most of the above numerical simulations and ex-
perimental studies considered homogenized concrete material proper-
ties, in other words usually only mortar material without aggregate is
considered because of the specimen size limitation in performing
high-speed impact tests, and difficulties in developing detailed numer-
ical models of composite concrete material. However, real concrete con-
sists of mortar matrix, aggregates and interfacial transition zone (ITZ)
between mortar matrix and aggregates. Because different components
in concrete mixture have different material properties, representing
concrete by mortar material alone may lead to unreliable predictions
of concrete material properties in both experimental and numerical
studies. Erzar et al. investigated the aggregate size effect on dynamic
concrete behaviour under impact loadings but only examined moisture
effect and crack development in the compressive experiments [33].
According to the laboratory test results reported by Grote et al., aggre-
gates in concrete specimen under plate impact contribute to DIF [8].
Park et al. carried out numerical simulations and further indicated
that with the increase of aggregate volume fraction from 0 to 42%, the
strength and energy dissipation of the specimen are enhanced [34].
With distinctive consideration of mortar matrix, aggregates and ITZ,
Zhou and Hao developed mesoscale model to simulate impact tests
[44]. From numerical simulations, it was observed that under high-
speed impact loading the stress wave propagates inside the speci-
men and causes the specimen to deform so quickly that the crack
has not enough time to find the relatively weaker section to develop.
 Y. Hao et al. / Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70
Consequently, it has to propagate through the aggregates and cause
damage to them. Because of the relatively higher strength of aggregate,
the concrete material strength becomes higher under dynamic loading
conditions. In the above study, because of the limitation in computer
power, very small concrete specimen was considered. Subsequently,
Hao and his co-workers extended the work of Zhou and Hao [44] by
considering the influences of different specimen sizes, different aggre-
gate sizes and different percentages, and analysed the relative contribu-
tions of various influencing factors on DIF obtained in impact tests
[35–37]. All these studies clearly demonstrated the contributions of ag-
gregates to DIF of concrete materials.
1.3. End friction confinement
As illustrated in Fig. 2, another important structural effect induced in
dynamic compressive tests is the end friction confinement. Similar to
the lateral inertia confinement, the friction at specimen–apparatus in-
terfaces constrains the lateral deformation of the specimen under
rapid compression, contributing to the increase in strength of material
subjected to impact loadings in SHPB tests. Since the SHPB technique
was firstly applied in testing metal materials, the end friction confine-
ment effect was observed and discussed mainly based on such materials.
To minimize its influence on the testing results of metal materials,
Davies and Hunter proposed an equation for an optimal L/D ratio, the
ratio of length to diameter for cylindrical specimens [5]. However, the
equation may not be applicable for concrete materials because they
are more brittle and sensitive to hydrostatic stress than metal materials.
Hakalehto observed that rock specimens were able to transmit more en-
ergy as the specimen length became shorter and the influence of the
confining effect became greater [38]. As stated previously, Bertholf and
Karnes concluded that friction could produce additional constraints
and result in multi-axial stress states [28]. Unfortunately, in most exper-
imental studies published in the literature concerning brittle materials
such as concrete and rock in SHPB tests, the end friction effect is rarely
discussed. The boundary conditions of the specimen are not clearly
reported, e.g. whether the specimen is lubricated at both surfaces and
how much is the friction coefficient between the specimen and the pres-
sure bars. Using commercial software package for numerical simula-
tions, Li and Meng discussed end friction confinement effect and found
that for concrete specimens with L/D = 0.5, the influence of the friction
coefficient μ on DIF is insignificant when μ is less than 0.1, but becomes
considerable when it is larger than 0.2 [29]. However, all the numerical
simulations in [29] were based on specimen modelled by mortar mate-
rial only, which may underestimate DIF of the real concrete specimen by
neglecting the contributions from aggregates. On the other hand, in a
numerical study by Lu et al., a fully fixed boundary was used to restrict
the lateral deformation, equivalent to setting the friction infinite, at
both ends of the concrete specimen [39]. The boundary that fully limits
the radial deformation is not realistic in SHPB tests and thus the model is
not suitable to quantitatively investigate the influence of friction con-
finement effect on dynamic impact tests. Parametric numerical simula-
tions of the end friction confinement effects on concrete material DIF
using mesoscale model with consideration of components in typical
concrete materials, i.e. mortar and aggregates, were conducted by Hao
et al. [40]. It was found that the L/D ratio, friction coefficient and strain
rate strongly affect the stress and strain distributions and the failure pat-
terns of concrete specimen, and their influences are often coupled with
each other. An equation to remove the influence of end friction confine-
ment on DIF considering the L/D ratio, friction coefficient and strain rate
as variables was also proposed [40].
1.4. Scope of the present study
From the above review of literature, it is noticeable that most of
the previous works regarding the possible influencing factors on the
dynamic behaviour of concrete material under uniaxial compression
65
are based on numerical studies whereas experimental studies con-
cerning these effects on the material behaviour of real concrete are
quite limited. Authors of Ref. [30] conducted tests but the work only
focused on observing the lateral inertia confinement effect, and the
tested specimens are made of mortar material only. No systematic ex-
perimental study that devotes to investigating the mentioned influ-
ential factors on real concrete containing coarse aggregates can be
found in the literature yet. The present study carries out a series of
experimental tests aiming to systematically study the influences of
the possible factors in SHPB tests and verify the observation based
on previous numerical studies. With the application of grease at spec-
imen–bar interfaces, concrete specimens with the same proportion of
mixtures, the same L/D ratio, but different diameters are prepared to
examine the influence of lateral inertia confinement while specimens
with the same dimension but different mixtures of aggregates, i.e.
different maximum aggregate sizes or different aggregate volume
fractions, are prepared to investigate the roles of aggregates in the dy-
namic behaviour of concrete material under high-rate impact. More-
over, without the application of grease at specimen–bar interfaces,
specimens with the same mixture but different L/D ratios are pre-
pared to study the influence from end friction confinement generated
in SHPB tests. Before the test a force scale is used to obtain the static
friction coefficients between the specimens and apparatus. The strain
rate achieved by SHPB tests in this study ranges from 47/s to 420/s.
The SHPB test results presented in this study are validated by checking
the longitudinal stress equilibrium of the specimen. The influences of
lateral inertia confinement, aggregate size, aggregate volume fraction,
and end friction confinement on the dynamic compressive strength of
concrete material at high strain rate are discussed. The proposed rela-
tions to remove the influences of lateral inertia and end friction confine-
ments in [36] and [40] are verified by the experimental data.
2. Experimental programme
2.1. Concrete mixture and specimen dimensions
The cement used to prepare the SHPB specimens is Portland cement.
The mortar matrix is a mixture of water, cement and sand. The mass
ratio of the three materials is 1:2:2.25. Careful consideration has been
made to design the mixtures and dimensions of cylindrical specimens
for investigating a specific influential factor. To examine the influence
from lateral inertia confinement, Ø40–20 mm, Ø32–16 mm, and Ø22–
11 mm specimens with the same L/D ratio but different diameters
were prepared. For the roles of aggregates in the dynamic behaviour
of concrete material under high-rate impact, the effects of aggregate
size and volume content were considered for investigation. Specimens
made of mortar matrix, concrete with large aggregates up to 8 mm,
and concrete with small aggregates up to 4 mm were prepared for in-
vestigating the influence of aggregate size, while specimens made of
concrete with small aggregates up to 4 mm but different volume frac-
tions, namely 19% and 42%, were used to study the influence of aggre-
gate volume fraction. Ø32–30 mm, Ø32–20 mm, and Ø32–11 mm
concrete specimens with L/D ratios close to 3/3, 2/3, and 1/3, respective-
ly, were prepared to investigate the influence of end friction confine-
ment generated in SHPB tests. In preparing the specimens, large size
concrete cubes were casted and cured first. Cylindrical specimens of dif-
ferent sizes were drilled from the concrete cubes, smoothened, and
dried before the tests. Fig. 3 shows the prepared specimens used in
SHPB tests. The quasi-static properties of different specimens are listed
in Table 1.
2.2. SHPB test apparatus
The test system including the SHPB setup and the data acquisition
system is shown in Fig. 4. Both pressure bars have the same dimen-
sion Ø40–2000 mm and the absorption bar is Ø40–1000 mm. Strain
66 Y. Hao et al. / Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70

(a) Concrete cubes (b) Ø40-20mm specimens (c) Ø22-11 mm specimens

(d) Ø32-16 mm specimens with (e) Ø32-16 mm specimens with (f) Ø32-30, Ø32-20 and Ø32-10
large aggregates small aggregates mm specimens

Fig. 3. Specimens used in SHPB tests.

gauges are attached at the centres of the pressure bars. The bars are
made of stainless steel with Young's modulus 200 GPa, density
7800 kg/m3, elastic wave velocity 5064 m/s, and Poisson's ratio 0.3.
Based on the theory of one-dimensional stress wave propagation,
the equations below are used to calculate the stress, strain rate and
strain of the specimen in SHPB test, respectively [41].
 
A SHPB tests presented in this paper.
σ ðt Þ ¼ E ε ðt Þ
As T
The stress-time histories recorded by the gauges on pressure bars
of an SHPB test on a Ø40–20 mm specimen are shown in Fig. 5 where
the stress history at the incident surface of the specimen obtained
from Eq. (4) is also included for comparison with the transmitted
stress wave to check the stress equilibrium in the specimen. The
strain rate reached 271/s. It should be noted that the time lags are
removed for clearer comparisons. From Fig. 5, it can be seen that
the stress equilibrium state is achieved, indicating the validity of the
ð1Þ

2C 0 3. Results and discussions

ε_ ðt Þ ¼ − ε ðt Þ ð2Þ
L R
3.1. Lateral inertia confinement
T
εðt Þ ¼ ∫ ε_ ðt Þdt ð3Þ
0
For concrete material that is sensitive to confining pressure, the
influence from lateral inertia confinement as a structural effect always
where E, A and C0 are the Young's modulus, cross sectional area and exists in high-speed impact tests. The lateral inertia confinement is de-
elastic wave velocity of pressure bars; As and L are the cross sectional pendent on the density of the material and the size of the tested sam-
area and length of the tested specimen; and εT and εR are the mea- ples. To confirm this, specimens with the same L/D ratio equal to 0.5,
sured transmitted and reflected strains. the same aggregate contents (aggregates up to 4 mm with volume frac-
It should be noted that the achievement of the longitudinal stress tion 42%), but different diameters, i.e. 22 mm, 32 mm and 40 mm, were
equilibrium is essential for a valid SHPB test [42]. Eq. (4) is used to ob- prepared for SHPB tests to examine the influence from lateral inertia
tain the stress wave at the incident surface of the specimen in SHPB confinement at high strain rate. Grease was applied at the specimen–
tests, which will be compared to the transmitted stress wave to bar interfaces to minimize the influence of end friction confinement.
check the stress equilibrium. The obtained DIFs from SHPB tests with respect to strain rates are
shown and compared in Fig. 6. From the figure, it can be seen that
when the strain rate is lower than 90/s, the obtained DIFs from speci-
σ IS ¼ σ I þ σ R ð4Þ mens with different diameters do not show significant difference. How-
ever, when the strain rate increases, the obtained DIFs are clearly
where σI and σR are the incident and reflected stresses, respectively. different, demonstrating the influence of lateral inertia confinement.

Table 1
Summary of specimens with different considerations and purposes.

Specimen Dimension Maximum Grease Aggregate Compressive Purpose/comments

mixture aggregate size applied volume fraction strength

Concrete Ø40–20 mm 4 mm Yes 42% 42.1 MPa Examine lateral inertia confinement effect (Section 3.1)
Ø22–11 mm 4 mm Yes 42% 45.5 MPa
Ø32–16 mm 4 mm Yes 42% 44.4 MPa Examine lateral inertia confinement effect (Section 3.1),
aggregate size effect (Section 3.2.1), and aggregate
volume fraction effect (Section 3.2.2)
Ø32–16 mm 8 mm Yes 42% 37.6 MPa Examine aggregate size effect (Section 3.2.1)
Ø32–16 mm 4 mm Yes 19% 39.2 MPa Examine aggregate volume fraction effect (Section 3.2.2)
Ø32–30 mm 4 mm No 42% 41.2 MPa Examine end friction confinement effect (Section 3.3)
Ø32–20 mm 4 mm No 42% 45.3 MPa
Ø32–10 mm 4 mm No 42% 48.8 MPa
Mortar Ø32–16 mm – Yes – 47.1 MPa Examine aggregate size effect (Section 3.2.1) and
aggregate volume fraction effect (Section 3.2.2)
 Y. Hao et al. / Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70 67

Fig. 4. SHPB test system.

With the increase of strain rate, the difference in DIF values among
specimens with different dimensions is more significant, indicating
that the influence from lateral inertia confinement is strain rate sensi-
tive. The findings are consistent with those concluded by other re-
searchers [30]. Moreover, the testing data clearly show that DIF values
increase with the specimen diameter at the same strain rate, indicating
that the lateral inertia confinement effect is specimen size dependent.
These results also confirm the observations made in previous study
based on numerical simulations [35] that DIF directly obtained from
high-speed impact tests consists of contributions from material strain
rate effect and structural effect.
A method to remove the influence from lateral inertia confine-
ment (structural effect) was proposed to derive the DIF of the mate-
rial strain rate effect in [36]. The derived DIF relations for mortar
and aggregate are
DIFMortar ¼ 0:0419ðlogε_ Þ þ 1:2165 for 1=s < ˙ ε ≤ 30=s
DIFMortar ¼ 0:8988ðlogε_ Þ2 −2:8255ðlogε_ Þ þ 3:4907 for 30=s < ˙ ε ≤ 1000=s
DIFAggregate ¼ 0:0191ðlogε_ Þ þ 1:2222 for 1=s < ˙ ε ≤ 220=s
DIFAggregate ¼ 1:6607ðlogε_ Þ2 −6:9122ðlogε_ Þ þ 8:346 for 220=s < ˙ ε ≤ 1000=s:
mesoscale numerical model with distinctive consideration of the ran-
domly distributed aggregates in mortar matrix is used to simulate the
above SHPB tests. The DIF relations given above are used to describe
the material strength increment. The detailed descriptions of the me-
soscale model can be found in Ref. [36], which is not presented here.
Because the lateral inertia confinement effect is included in numerical
simulation as well, if the simulated results agree with the experimen-
tal data, the validity of the above DIF formulae without lateral inertia
confinement effect is then verified. The numerically simulated results
for the three sets of tested specimens are also given in Fig. 6. As
shown, the numerically simulated DIF agrees well with the experi-
mental test data, proving the validity of the proposed formulae in
[36] based on numerical simulations.
To further observe the lateral inertia confinement, the mesoscale
numerical model is used to simulate SHPB tests on Ø100–50 mm con-
crete specimens. The results are also shown in Fig. 6. As can be seen,
ð5Þ further increasing the diameter of the concrete specimens from
40 mm to 100 mm leads to significantly larger DIFs at high strain rate.
The above results confirm the existence of lateral inertia confine-
ð6Þ ment and its contribution to DIF obtained in laboratory high-speed
impact tests. The test results also confirm that the empirical DIF rela-
ð7Þ tions for mortar and aggregate materials without lateral inertia con-
finement effect obtained from numerical simulations in [36]
accurately reflect the material strength increment at high strain rate.
ð8Þ 3.2. Contribution of aggregates

The accuracy of these relations has not been verified with experi- The effects of aggregate size and volume fraction on the concrete
mental data yet. Because lateral inertia confinement effect always compressive strength at high strain rate are investigated in this sec-
exists in impact tests and cannot be removed, the accuracy of these tion. All specimens were prepared with the same dimension of
relations can only be indirectly verified. In this study, the same Ø32–16 mm while grease was also applied at the specimen–bar in-
terfaces to minimize the confinement from end friction in SHPB
150 tests. With the same geometry and boundary condition, the only dif-
ference among the specimens is the material mixture with different
Incident stress
100 aggregate sizes and volumes. Specimens made of mortar matrix with-
Reflected stress out aggregate were also tested for comparison.
50
Stress(MPa)

0 3.2.1. Influence of aggregate size

Two batches of Ø32–16 mm concrete specimens with 42% aggre-
-50 gates but the largest aggregate size up to either 4 mm or 8 mm, respec-
-100 tively, were prepared to study the influence of aggregate size in
high-speed impact tests. The obtained DIFs versus strain rates for mor-
-150 tar and concrete specimens are plotted in Fig. 7. It can be seen that DIFs
of specimens with aggregates are always higher than those without ag-
-200
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000 gregates. This is because, as mentioned previously, under high-rate im-
Time (µs) pact loads, the crack does not have enough time to seek weaker
sections, but has to propagate through relatively tougher aggregates,
Fig. 5. Stress equilibrium check (Ø40–20 mm specimen under a strain rate of 271/s). thus resulting in higher level of specimen strengths. As shown, with
68 Y. Hao et al. / Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70

4
Ø100-50 mm [40]
Ø40-20 mm
3.5
Ø32-16 mm
Ø22-11 mm
Numerical simulation results
3
Simulations on Ø40-20
mm specimen
DIF 2.5

Simulations on Ø22-11
1.5 mm specimen
Simulations on Ø32-16
mm specimen

1
10 100 1000
Strain rate (1/s)

Fig. 6. Comparison of DIFs from specimens with different diameters.

the increase of aggregate size, the obtained DIF decreases. This is be-
cause the total volumes of aggregates used in the two batches of speci-
mens are the same. Larger aggregates mean less number of them in the
specimen, which leads to less failure faces under the same impact load-
ing. Therefore a relatively smaller DIF is achieved in the tests. As also can
be noticed, due to the increased heterogeneity caused by the relatively
large coarse aggregates in the specimen, the obtained DIFs are more dis-
persive than those of mortar and specimens with smaller aggregates.
These results indicate that concrete mixed with smaller size aggregates
would perform better under dynamic loadings.
3.2.2. Influence of aggregate volume fraction
To examine the effect of the amount of aggregates included in the
concrete mixture on DIF, specimens with different volume fractions
of aggregates, namely 19% and 42%, were prepared and tested. Aggre-
gates up to 4 mm are mixed for both batches of concrete specimens.
The obtained DIFs from SHPB tests on concrete and mortar specimens
are given in Fig. 8. It can be observed again that DIFs of specimens
with the inclusion of aggregates are always higher than those of mor-
tar specimens without aggregates, indicating the contribution of ag-
gregates to the dynamic compressive strength of concrete material
at high strain rate. Increasing the volume fraction of aggregates
from 19% to 42% in the concrete mixtures leads to higher DIFs.
These test results also confirm the observations made in a previous
study based on numerical simulations [36].
3.3. End friction confinement
According to the findings based on numerical simulations presented
in [40], the L/D ratio, friction coefficient, and strain rate all strongly af-
fect the stress and strain distributions and the failure pattern of concrete
specimen; and their influences are often coupled with each other. To
experimentally verify these, concrete specimens with three dimensions,
that is Ø32–30 mm, Ø32–20 mm, and Ø32–10 mm, corresponding
to L/D ratios close to 3/3, 2/3, and 1/3, respectively, were prepared
for SHPB tests. The maximum aggregate size in the mixture was limited
to 4 mm. No grease was applied at specimen–bar interfaces. Before the
impact test, force scale was applied to obtain the friction coefficient as
illustrated in Fig. 9. The average friction coefficient between concrete
and steel is 0.235 for all specimens in the present study.
DIFs from SHPB tests where no grease is applied to the specimen–
bar interfaces on concrete specimens with different L/D ratios are com-
pared in Fig. 10. As shown, with the increase of L/D ratio of specimens,
reduction in values of the obtained DIFs can be found. The difference
of DIFs from Ø32–10 mm specimens and those from the other speci-
mens is not pronounced under relatively low strain rate, but becomes
prominent with the increasing strain rate, which is consistent with
the findings in [40] that the dynamic strength of cylindrical concrete
specimens is sensitive to the L/D ratio, and the influence of end friction
confinement becomes more significant with the decrease in specimen
L/D ratio and increase in strain rate. Moreover, DIF is the dynamic
strength normalized by the corresponding static strength. It can be

3 3

2.5 2.5

2 2
DIF

Ø32-16 mm no
DIF

1.5 1.5
aggregate

1 1 Ø32-16 mm 19%
Ø32-16 mm no aggregate small aggregates

0.5 Ø32-16 mm 42% large aggregates 0.5 Ø32-16 mm 42%

Ø32-16 mm 42% small aggregates small aggregates
0 0
10 100 1000 10 100 1000
Strain rate (1/s) Strain rate (1/s)

Fig. 7. Comparison of DIFs from Ø32–16 mm specimens with different maximum Fig. 8. Comparison of DIFs from Ø32–16 mm specimens with different aggregate volume
aggregate sizes. fractions.
 Y. Hao et al. / Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70 69

4.5
4
3.5
3
2.5

DIF
2
1.5
Derived DIFµ=0 from Eq. (10) using µ=0.235
1
Best-fit curve
0.5
Ref DIFµ=0 relation [40]
0
10 100 1000
Strain rate (1/s)

Fig. 11. Comparison of DIFμ = 0 curves from tests and [40] using μ = 0.235.

Fig. 9. Measurement of static friction coefficients using force scale.
observed in Table 1 that the static strength increases with the decrease
of L/D ratio while Fig. 10 shows that the normalized dynamic strength,
i.e. DIF, increases with the decrease of L/D ratio, indicating that the effect
of L/D ratio on the dynamic strength is more pronounced than that on
the static strength. Since dynamic friction coefficient is usually smaller
than its static counterpart, this observation indicates that the coupling
of stress wave propagation with the end restrain (friction confinement)
makes the dynamic strength more sensitive to the L/D ratio.
In [40], an empirical relation is proposed to estimate the ratio of
DIFs obtained from numerically simulated SHPB tests with end fric-
tion confinements to those without end frictions with respect to the
L/D ratio of specimen, the value of friction coefficient and the strain
rate as given in Eq. (9) for removing the end friction confinement ef-
fect on concrete dynamic strength obtained in SHPB test.
DIFμ¼0
¼ exp½
3:052410−2 ðL=DÞ−0:2494ðμ Þ−0:1043ðlogε_ Þþ0:1563
χ¼
DIFμ>0 ð9Þ
for 0:5 ≤ L=D ≤ 2:0; 0:0 ≤ μ ≤ 0:5 and 10=s ≤ ˙ ε ≤ 600=s
where
DIFμ¼0 ¼ 0:6346ðlogε_ Þ2 −1:0835ðlogε_ Þ þ 2:0558 for 10=s ≤ ˙ ε ≤ 600=s:
ð10Þ
The accuracy of the above numerically derived relation is verified in
this study with the experimental test results. To do that, the above
equation is used to correct the experimentally obtained DIF for deriving
the DIF of concrete material without end friction confinement effect,
DIFμ = 0. Fig. 11 shows the DIF data obtained in this experimental
study after correction and those proposed in [40] for concrete material
DIF. It can be seen that using the static friction coefficient of 0.235 in
the above equation to correct the test data, the best-fit curve from the
corrected data is apparently smaller than the reference material DIF
curve proposed in [40]. Nonetheless the tendencies of the two curves
are quite similar. The reason is that the static friction coefficient is not
equal to the dynamic friction coefficient. In this study, only the static
friction coefficient was obtained because it is difficult to determine
the dynamic friction coefficient in the test. Assuming the dynamic fric-
tion coefficient is smaller than its static counterpart, by applying the
friction coefficient μ = 0.1 in Eq. (9) to correct the test data, the derived
DIFμ = 0 and its best-fit curve are plotted in Fig. 12 for comparison with
the reference curve given in [40]. It can be clearly observed that using
μ = 0.1, the best-fit curve from the corrected test data closely matches
the reference curve. This comparison proves that the proposed empiri-
cal relations to remove the end friction confinement effect in SHPB tests,
and the suggested DIF relation of concrete material in [40] based on nu-
merical simulations yield good predictions of concrete compressive DIF
from SHPB tests. However, it should be noted that the above compari-
son is based on the assumption of dynamic friction coefficient between
concrete and steel surfaces. Although the assumption is believed rea-
sonable, the exact dynamic friction coefficient is not known. The
above results also reveal that the static friction coefficient is larger
than dynamic friction coefficient. This observation is consistent with
the conclusions made in [43] that the value of friction coefficient is not
constant, and the kinetic friction coefficient is normally smaller than
the static friction coefficient.

4.5
4.5
4 Ø32-30 mm 4
3.5 Ø32-20 mm 3.5
Ø32-10 mm 3
3
DIF

2.5
DIF

2.5 2

2 1.5 Derived DIFµ=0 from Eq. (10) using µ=0.1

1 Best-fit curve
1.5
0.5 Ref DIFµ=0 relation [40]
1 0
10 100 1000 10 100 1000
Strain rate (1/s) Strain rate (1/s)

Fig. 10. Comparison of DIFs from specimens with different dimensions. Fig. 12. Comparison of DIFμ = 0 curves from tests and [40] using μ = 0.1.
70 Y. Hao et al. / Cement and Concrete Research 52 (2013) 63–70
4. Conclusions
The present study performed SHPB experimental tests to investi-
gate the influences of lateral inertia confinement effect, end friction
confinement effect and aggregates on dynamic compressive strength
increment of concrete material. The test results clearly confirm the
contributions of lateral inertia confinement, end friction confinement
and aggregates in concrete mix to the dynamic strength increment at
high strain rate. The test data are also used to verify the previously
derived DIF relations of mortar and aggregates after removing the lat-
eral inertia confinement effect, DIF relations after removing the end
friction confinement effect, and the contributions of aggregates to
concrete material DIF. From the comparison and analysis of the
SHPB test results, the following conclusions can be drawn.
• The lateral inertia confinement does affect the dynamic properties
of concrete material subjected to high-speed impact loadings, and
its influence is sensitive to specimen diameter. The modified DIF re-
lations with lateral inertia confinement effect removed in [36] for
mortar matrix and aggregate are proven to be reliable.
• The contribution of aggregates in the concrete specimen is consid-
erable, especially at relatively high strain rate. DIFs of specimens
with aggregates are always higher than those without aggregates.
With the increase of aggregate size, the heterogeneity of the mate-
rial increases whereas the obtained DIF decreases and is more dis-
persive. Increasing the volume fraction of aggregates in the
concrete mixtures leads to a higher dynamic strength of concrete
material under high strain rate.
• DIFs obtained from SHPB tests are found to decrease with the in-
crease of the L/D ratio of the tested concrete specimens, indicating
that the influence of end friction confinement is dependent on the
specimen geometry.
• The proposed equation in [40] to remove the influence of end fric-
tion confinement is verified using the experimental test data. Kinet-
ic friction coefficient should be used for estimating the correction
coefficient to remove the end friction confinement effect in DIF
obtained from SHPB tests.
• The observations and conclusions made in previous numerical stud-
ies [35,36,40] on the influences of lateral inertia confinement, end
friction confinement and aggregates on dynamic strength incre-
ment of concrete material obtained in SHPB test are confirmed in
the experimental tests.
Acknowledgement
The authors would like to acknowledge the Australian Research
Council (grant number DP130104332) and the China National Natural
Science Foundation (grant number 51078094) for financial support to
carry out this study.
References
[1] P. Forquin, G. Gary, F. Gatuingt, A testing technique for concrete under confine-
ment at high rates of strain, Int. J. Impact Eng. 35 (2008) 425–446.
[2] Z. Xu, H. Hao, H.N. Li, Experimental study of dynamic compressive properties of fibre
reinforced concrete material with different fibres, Mater. Des. 33 (2012) 42–55.
[3] H. Hao, B.G. Tarasov, Experimental study of dynamic material properties of clay brick
and mortar at different strain rates, Aust. J. Struct. Eng. 8 (2) (2008) 117–132.
[4] J.E. Field, S.M. Walley, W.G. Proud, H.T. Goldrein, C.R. Siviour, Review of experimental
techniques for high rate deformation and shock studies, Int. J. Impact Eng. 30 (2004)
725–775.
[5] E.D.H. Davies, S.C. Hunter, The dynamic compression testing of solids by the method
of the split Hopkinson pressure bar, J. Mech. Phys. Solids 11 (1963) 155–179.
[6] I. Jawed, G. Childs, A. Ritter, S. Winzer, T. Johnson, D. Barker, High-strain-rate be-
havior of hydrated cement pastes, Cem. Concr. Res. 17 (1987) 433–440.
[7] W. Li, J. Xu, Mechanical properties of basalt fiber reinforced geopolymeric con-
crete under impact loading, Mater. Sci. Eng., A 505 (2009) 178–186.
[8] D.L. Grote, S.W. Park, M. Zhou, Dynamic behavior of concrete at high strain rates and
pressures: I. experimental characterization, Int. J. Impact Eng. 25 (2001) 869–886.
[9] Q.Z. Wang, W. Li, X.L. Song, A method for testing dynamic tensile strength and elastic
modulus of rock materials using SHPB, Pure Appl. Geophys. 163 (2006) 1091–1100.
[10] J.R. Klepaczko, A. Brara, An experimental method for dynamic tensile testing of
concrete by spalling, Int. J. Impact Eng. 25 (2001) 387–409.
[11] D. Yan, G. Lin, Dynamic properties of concrete in direct tension, Cem. Concr. Res.
36 (2006) 1371–1378.
[12] A. Brara, F. Camborde, J.R. Klepaczko, C. Mariotti, Experimental and numerical
study of concrete at high strain rates in tension, Mech. Mater. 33 (2001) 33–45.
[13] M. Diamaruya, H. Kobayashi, T. Nonaka, Impact tensile strength and fracture of
concrete, J. Phys. IV 7 (C3) (1997) 253–258.
[14] H.W. Reinhardt, P. Rossi, J.G.M. van Mier, Joint investigation of concrete at high
rates of loading, Mater. Struct. 23 (1990) 213–216.
[15] J.W. Tedesco, C.A. Ross, P.B. McGill, B.P. O'Neil, Numerical analysis of high strain
rate concrete direct tension tests, Comput. Struct. 40 (2) (1991) 313–327.
[16] J. Weerheijm, J.C.A.M. van Doormaal, Tensile failure of concrete at high loading
rates: new test data on strength and fracture energy from instrumented spalling
tests, Int. J. Impact Eng. 34 (2007) 609–626.
[17] C.A. Ross, D.M. Jerome, J.W. Tedesco, Moisture and strain rate effects on concrete
strength, ACI Mater. J. 93 (3) (1996) 293–298.
[18] J.W. Tedesco, C.A. Ross, Strain-rate-dependent constitutive equations for con-
crete, J. Press. Vessel. Technol. 120 (1998) 398–405.
[19] L.J. Malvar, J.E. Crawford, Dynamic increase factors for concrete, Proceedings of
the 28th DDESB Seminar, ANSI Std., Orlando, FL, 1998, pp. 1–17.
[20] H. Schuler, C. Mayrhofer, K. Thoma, Spall experiments for the measurement of the
tensile strength and fracture energy of concrete at high strain rates, Int. J. Impact
Eng. 32 (2006) 1635–1650.
[21] Comite Euro-International du Beton, CEB-FIP Model Code 1990, Redwood Books,
Wiltshire, 1993.
[22] D.M. Cotsovos, M.N. Pavlović, Numerical investigation of concrete subjected to
compressive impact loading. Part 1: a fundamental explanation for the apparent
strength gain at high loading rates, Comput. Struct. 86 (2008) 145–163.
[23] P.H. Bischoff, S.H. Perry, Compressive behaviour of concrete at high strain rates,
Mater. Struct. 24 (1991) 425-450.
[24] H. Le Nard, P. Bailly, Dynamic behaviour of concrete: the structural effects on
compressive strength increase, Mech. Cohes.-Frict. Mater. 5 (2000) 491–510.
[25] D.M. Cotsovos, M.N. Pavlović, Numerical investigation of concrete subjected to
high rates of uniaxial tensile loading, Int. J. Impact Eng. 35 (2008) 319–335.
[26] T. Tang, L.E. Malvern, D.A. Jenkins, Rate effects in uniaxial dynamic compression
of concrete, ASCE J. Eng. Mech. 118 (1) (1992) 108–124.
[27] C. Huang, G. Subhash, Influence of lateral confinement on dynamic damage evo-
lution during uniaxial compressive response of brittle solids, J. Mech. Phys. Solids
51 (2003) 1089–1105.
[28] L.D. Bertholf, C.H. Karnes, Two-dimensional analysis of the split Hopkinson pres-
sure bar system, J. Mech. Phys. Solids 23 (1975) 1–19.
[29] Q.M. Li, H. Meng, About the dynamic strength enhancement of concrete-like ma-
terials in a split Hopkinson pressure bar test, Int. J. Solids Struct. 40 (2003)
343–360.
[30] M. Zhang, H.J. Wu, Q.M. Li, F.L. Huang, Further investigation on the dynamic com-
pressive strength enhancement of concrete-like materials based on split Hopkinson
pressure bar tests. Part I: experiments, Int. J. Impact Eng. 36 (2009) 1327–1334.
[31] Q.M. Li, Y.B. Lu, H. Meng, Further investigation on the dynamic compressive strength
enhancement of concrete-like materials based on split Hopkinson pressure bar tests.
Part II: numerical simulations, Int. J. Impact Eng. 36 (2009) 1335–1345.
[32] Y. Hao, H. Hao, Numerical investigation of the dynamic compressive behaviour of
rock materials at high strain rate, Rock Mech. Rock Eng. 46 (2) (2013) 373–388.
[33] B. Erzar, P. Forquin, C. Pontiroli, E. Buzaud, Influence of aggregate size and free water
on the dynamic behaviour of concrete subjected to impact loading, Proceedings of
the 14th International Conference on Experimental Mechanics, EPJ Web of Confer-
ences, 39007, EDP Sciences, 2010.
[34] S.W. Park, Q. Xia, M. Zhou, Dynamic behavior of concrete at high strain rates and
pressures: II. Numerical simulation, Int. J. Impact Eng. 25 (2001) 887–910.
[35] Y. Hao, H. Hao, Z.X. Li, Numerical analysis of lateral inertial confinement effects on
impact test of concrete compressive material properties, Int. J. Prot. Struct. 1 (1)
(2010) 145–167.
[36] Y. Hao, H. Hao, Numerical evaluation of the influence of aggregates on concrete
compressive strength at high strain rate, Int. J. Prot. Struct. 2 (2) (2011) 177–206.
[37] Y. Hao, H. Hao, X.H. Zhang, Numerical analysis of concrete material properties at
high strain rate under direct tension, Int. J. Impact Eng. 39 (2012) 51–62.
[38] K.O. Hakalehto, The behavior of rock under impulse loads, A Study Using the
Hopkinson Split Bar Method, CTA Polytechnica Scandinavica, Chemistry Including
Metallurgy: Series No. 81, 1969.
[39] Y. Lu, Z. Song, Z. Tu, Analysis of dynamic response of concrete using a mesoscale
model incorporating 3D effects, Int. J. Prot. Struct. 1 (2) (2010) 197–217.
[40] Y. Hao, H. Hao, Z.X. Li, Influence of end friction confinement on impact tests of
concrete material at high strain rate, Int. J. Impact Eng. 60 (2013) 82–106.
[41] U.S. Lindholm, Some experiments with the split Hopkinson pressure bar, J. Mech.
Phys. Solids 12 (1964) 317–335.
[42] Y.B. Lu, Q.M. Li, Appraisal of pulse-shaping technique in split Hopkinson pressure
bar tests for brittle materials, Int. J. Prot. Struct. 1 (3) (2010) 363–390.
[43] D. Pavelescu, A. Tudor, The sliding friction coefficient — its evolution and useful-
ness, Wear 120 (1987) 321–336.
[44] X.Q. Zhou, H. Hao, Modelling of compressive behaviour of concrete-like materials
at high strain rate, Int. J. Solids Struct. 45 (2008) 4648–4661.