INVESTIGATION OF FLUID STRUCTURE INTERACTION (FSI) EFFECT ON A FRP (FIBER REINFORCED POLYMER) POLE USING ANSYS

Abstract

This paper presents a simulation study on a fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) light pole that is being used in Yanbu Industrial City, Saudi Arabia. The light poles in this area are subjected to cyclic wind load blowing from the Red Sea. It is of great interest to re-investigate the strength and integrity of the structure for future improvement. A three-dimensional numerical simulation has been performed to analyze the effect of wind velocity over the FRP pole. The pole is conical in shape, having a circular hollow cross-section in both the ends and tapered uniformly. The pole considered for simulation is having a height of 6 meters and have conicity of 18 mm/m. The FRP pole is a combination of unsaturated polyester, vinyl ester, epoxy, phenolic, polyurethane, and glass fibers, which are reinforced by the centrifugal process. The computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation results are validated with the mathematical calculation. The adopted method is fluid-structure interaction (FSI) with SST k-ω (shear stress transport) turbulence model, which is used to simulate the wind velocity over the FRP pole using ANSYS Fluent. The velocity of air considered for simulation ranges from 10 to 50 m/sec. The study provided a good correlation between mathematical calculation and the CFD simulation for each air velocity. The study revealed maximum deflection and equivalent stress occurred at the top and bottom end, which are 217 mm and 85 MPa respectively. The exact region of crack is also predicted for different wind velocity. This method can also be adopted for any FRP poles available.