Upper-Bound Limit Analysis of Ultimate Pullout Capacity of Expanded Anchor Cable
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This paper presents an upper bound solution for the ultimate pullout capacity of the expanded anchor cable, which is expected to greatly facilitate the corresponding evaluation. In this solution, the ultimate end resistance and the ultimate lateral resistance of the expanded anchor cable are both taken into account, and their failure modes are reasonably constructed. On this basis, the upper bound solutions of both the ultimate end resistance and lateral resistance of the expanded anchor cable are derived using the upper bound theorem of limit analysis, respectively. The presented solution is also well verified through the comparison with the corresponding three-dimensional numerical simulation.
This paper is reasonable in structure and rich in content. It should be recognized that this paper fits well within the scope of the journal and the work has potential value, thus it can be considered for publication after some minor revisions on the language.
Author Response
Thanks for the reviewer’s positive comment. We have checked the language thoroughly in the manuscript and made corresponding modifications.
Reviewer 2 Report
This manuscript proposed a novel approach to evaluate the ultimate pullout capacity of the expanded anchor cable and tried to verify its accuracy. The approach seems to be useful for practical engineering. However, the reviewer thinks that some improvements should be considered before publication.
1. The effectiveness and accuracy are most important for a new approach. The following comments are suggested for consideration.
a) The author stated in Page 17 that the pullout force is determined when the computation becomes not convergent for the numerical simulation. As we all know, the convergence can be affected by various factors. For example, besides the load, the element/grid size may also affect the result. It is suggested that the effect of element/grid size or mesh sensitivity should be discussed.
b) The ultimate pullout capacities from analytical solution are only compared with those from numerical solution. Is there any reference solution in other references which can be cited and compared.
c) The authors stated that the existing theoretical calculations may bring large errors. Thus, it is suggested that results by using one or two existing theoretical formula should also be included in the examples to compare with those by using the present approach, to prove the superiority of the present approach.
2. Section 5 "Model Application" tried to compare the effects of various parameters. However, these works seem to be of limited significance and value for the approach and most results can be directly known from our common senses. The reviewer suggested that contribution of this section should be supplemented and highlighted, or the section could be directly deleted.
3. In the first line of Page 16, '3D grid' may be preferred instead of 'solid element' since the finite difference method is used.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The author needs to check the grammar thoroughly in the manuscript.
Author Response
Thanks for the reviewer’s comment. We have checked the grammar thoroughly in the manuscript and made corresponding modifications.
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
The authors have made appropriate modifications on the manuscript. The reviewer has no more comment and suggests it to be accepted for publication.
