ABSTRACT
Cement-based materials such as concrete are among the most common in civil engineering applications. The complexity of its response can mainly be attributed to its heterogenous nature. Sound knowledge of features such as the wall effect, and their relation to the internal structure, remain critical to the accurate representation of concrete behaviour in computational models. The presence of the wall effect on the material meso-structure has previously been demonstrated both experimentally and numerically, though only limited work addressed its effect on the material properties. The current contribution aims at performing such investigations by means of the Lattice Discrete Particle Method (LDPM). It is a powerful discrete mechanical model that effectively can simulate the heterogenous nature of concrete on the meso-scale. Recently, the framework was enhanced by a two-phase formulation, thereby allowing to introduce meaningful variability in elastic material properties linked to the heterogeneous mesostructure. This paper demonstrates the capabilities of the model in reproducing the wall effect in concrete.
