Nonlinear Elastic Analysis of Reinforcement Loads for Vertical Reinforced Soil Composites without Facing Restriction
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 142, Issue 6
Abstract
A nonlinear elastic method to analyze the reinforcement loads at the potential failure surface of a reinforced soil composite without facing restriction is developed in this study. The method makes use of the compatible deformations of soil and reinforcement at the potential failure surface and employs the hyperbolic stress-strain relationship to determine the tangential modulus of soil. Nonconstant Poisson’s ratio, nonlinear reinforcement load-strain behavior, and nonuniform reinforcement spacing can be taken into account. Effect of soil compaction is conveniently modeled by an equivalent compaction pressure and a pressure-dependent unloading-reloading Young’s modulus. The method can be implemented by a simple computer code. Four numerical model walls and four large-scale tests of reinforced soil composites were employed to validate the proposed method. It was shown that the method can be used to analyze the reinforcement loads of reinforced soil composites under working stress conditions. The method excludes the necessity to carry out sophisticated numerical analyses to determine the reinforcement loads.
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Acknowledgments
The author was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China to carry out this study (Grant #51379082). The financial support is gratefully acknowledged.
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Information
Published In
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 142 • Issue 6 • June 2016
Copyright
© 2016 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Mar 25, 2015
Accepted: Nov 6, 2015
Published online: Feb 29, 2016
Published in print: Jun 1, 2016
Discussion open until: Jul 29, 2016
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