Experimental Assessment and Justification of Measures to Ensure the Safety and Sustainability of the Functioning of Critical Elements of Hydraulic Structures

The most important scientific and practical task is the design and creation of safe, reliable, and durable hydraulic structures, which during operation can be subjected to various external influences. It is especially difficult to predict dynamic loads resulting from the unauthorized activities of third parties. Such incidents can interfere with the functioning of structures, lead to their destruction and, as a result, to catastrophic consequences for the economy, the environment, and the population. The results are considered related to the experimental studies of the penetrating action of small arms bullets into various materials. The studies were conducted for verifying the reliability of the results of a theoretical assessment of the penetrating effect of bullets. The possibility was considered related to the manufacturing protective screens in the field conditions, which guarantees non-penetration of critical elements of hydraulic structures by a bullet. As the main striking element, a bullet of a rifle cartridge 7,62×54R is considered. Experimental studies included a series of experiments with different targets. The number of shots on one target did not exceed 27, while the absence of through holes made it possible to speak of a 90 % confidence probability of non-penetration of the tested protective structure. Results of the experimental study showed that to ensure impenetrability, it is sufficient to use steel 2–3 mm thick, wood (pine) 18 mm or 250 mm of sand. In theoretical calculations, these values are obtained by 20–25 % more. Perhaps such discrepancies are due to the fact that the indenter in the model is represented by an absolutely solid body, while the bullets with a deformable steel core were used in the experiments. The algorithm proposed by the authors allows to choose a rational composition of the protective structure.