A physics-based rubble mound stability simulator for armour layers

A decade of research into forward modelling the individual responses of concrete armour units or quarried rock armour in rubble mound structures has had significant breakthroughs in recent years with the inclusion of wave interaction effects. Progress towards providing a physics-based simulator for armour movements is demonstrated including a comparison with equivalent experimentally-measured flume tests for Core-Loc structures conducted in Sogreah’s laboratories in 2009. The authors introduce these advances and discuss the likelihood that coastal engineers will, within the next decade, be using new physics-based simulation tools to supplement their customary design methods and wave tank laboratory testing. In this spotlight, attention falls on a renewed research effort towards experimental validation studies. New experiments are needed to transfer the current proof-of-concept FEMDEM numerical approaches into useable validated tools for coastal engineers.