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Permeability of Uniformly Graded 3D Printed Granular Media
Author(s) -
Wei Deheng,
Wang Zhongzheng,
Pereira JeanMichel,
Gan Yixiang
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/2020gl090728
Subject(s) - fractal dimension , fractal , permeability (electromagnetism) , surface finish , mechanics , scaling , materials science , granular material , geometry , mathematics , mathematical analysis , physics , composite material , chemistry , biochemistry , membrane
The present work explores water permeability of uniformly graded irregular grains using 3D printing with controlled shapes and fractal morphological features at low Reynold's number for viscous flow. From large amount of real 3D granular morphological data, a scaling law, in terms of fractal dimension, is found to be followed. With this universal law, sand grains with controlled fractal morphological features are generated using Spherical Harmonics, and then created using 3D printing technique for water permeability tests. A modified Kozeny‐Carman equation is proposed through more accurate determination of specific area, as a function of relative roughness and fractal dimension, than approximation using the volume‐equivalent sphere. By isolating the contributions from specific area, the shape coefficient is found to be insensitive to particle morphology. Through benchmarking the model prediction against experiments from both this work and past literature, we demonstrate the validity and wide applicability of the modified Kozeny‐Carman equation.