Role of shape on the forces on an intruder moving through a dense granular medium

BK Tripura and S Kumar and KA Reddy and J Talbot, PARTICULATE SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY, 40, 651-661 (2022).

DOI: 10.1080/02726351.2021.1983905

We use numerical simulation to investigate the effect an intruder's shape has on the drag and lift forces that it experiences while moving through a granular medium composed of polydisperse disks of mean diameter d. The intruder velocity, v, was varied from 0.1 dg to 20 dg. For frictionless particles (mu=0.0), there is a gradual increase in drag force with increasing v, whereas, for frictional systems (mu=0.1,0.5), a constant drag regime appears at low velocities. The drag force depends weakly on the object's shape provided that its cross-section is constant. The drag force depends linearly on the immersion depth, while the lift force varies weakly with depth for certain shapes. The lift experienced by the object is a strong function of its shape at a given velocity. The shape has an effect on the distribution of contacts around the surface of the intruder, which may result in a strong lift for certain shapes. We also present and discuss the force profiles around the intruder surface.

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