Deformation of Unbound Granular Materials in Three-Dimensional Stress State
Publication: Geo-Congress 2024
ABSTRACT
Unbound granular materials (UGMs) are extensively used in pavements mostly as subgrade and subbase materials. Excessive permanent settlement or rutting is the main damage mechanism encountered in UGMs. Rutting is a result of accumulated gradual plastic strain in the subbase and subgrade layers subjected to repetitive traffic loadings. Axisymmetric triaxial apparatus or repeated lateral triaxial (RLT) devices are commonly used to explore the rutting of UGMs. However, these devices are not able to capture the actual stress state generated in traffic. A soil element in pavement layers is in a three-dimensional (3D) stress state and includes all three components of cyclic principal stresses. A typical pavement also can be considered geometrically as a plane strain structure. Accordingly, aim of this study is to carry out experiments to determine the long-term deformation of a silty sand in plane strain and in a 3D stress state using a multistage true triaxial apparatus (TTA). It is found that the permanent deformation of UGMs under plane strain and 3D anisotropic stress state differs significantly from that under axisymmetric stress. An increase in the intermediate principal stress was observed to decrease the total and permanent deformation. An increase in cyclic stress level was also found to increase the rutting in UGMs. The deformation of soil under the plane strain state was found to be less than that in the axisymmetric stress state but falls into an intermediate range when compared to tests involving 3D cyclic loading.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this chapter.
REFERENCES
Abdollahi, M., and F. Vahedifard. (2022). “Predicting Resilient Modulus of Unsaturated Subgrade Soils Considering Effects of Water Content, Temperature, and Hydraulic Hysteresis.” International Journal of Geomechanics 22(1): 04021259.
Austroads. (2007). Determination of permanent deformation and resilient modulus characteristics of unbound granular materials under drained conditions, Austroads Sydney.
Barksdale, R. D. (1972). Laboratory evaluation of rutting in base course materials. Presented at the Third International Conference on the Structural Design of Asphalt Pavements, Grosvenor House, Park Lane, London, England, Sept. 11-15, 1972.
Bodin, D. (2017). Improved laboratory characterisation of the deformation properties of granular materials.
Brown, S., and A. Hyde. (1975). “Significance of cyclic confining stress in repeated-load triaxial testing of granular material.” Transportation research record(537).
CEN (European Committee for Standardization). Cyclic load triaxial test for unbound mixtures. Brussels: European Standard. ; 2004.
Cui, X., N. Zhang, J. Zhang, and Z. Gao. (2014). “In situ tests simulating traffic-load-induced settlement of alluvial silt subsoil.” Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 58: 10–20.
Dutta, T. T., and J. Kodikara. (2022). “Evaluation of unbound/subgrade material rutting and resilient behaviour based on initial density and saturation degree.” Transportation Geotechnics: 100782.
Golalipour, A., E. Jamshidi, Y. Niazi, Z. Afsharikia, and M. Khadem. (2012). “Effect of aggregate gradation on rutting of asphalt pavements.” Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences 53: 440–449.
Gu, C., Y. Wang, Y. Cui, Y. Cai, and J. Wang. (2019). “One-way cyclic behavior of saturated clay in 3D stress state.” Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering 145(10): 04019077.
Gu, C., X. Ye, Z. Cao, Y. Cai, J. Wang, and T. Zhang. (2020). “Resilient behavior of coarse granular materials in three dimensional anisotropic stress state.” Engineering Geology 279: 105848.
Gu, C., X. Ye, J. Wang, Y. Cai, Z. Cao, and T. Zhang. (2020). “Resilient behavior of coarse granular materials in three-dimensional stress state.” Canadian Geotechnical Journal 57(9): 1280–1293.
Han, Z., and S. K. Vanapalli. (2016). “State-of-the-Art: Prediction of resilient modulus of unsaturated subgrade soils.” International Journal of Geomechanics 16(4): 04015104.
Hao, S., and T. Pabst. (2022). “Experimental Investigation and Prediction of the Permanent Deformation of Crushed Waste Rock Using an Artificial Neural Network Model.” International Journal of Geomechanics 22(5): 04022032.
Imam, R., S. V. Maghvan, and J. McCartney. (2018). Shear strength of unsaturated sand at different relative densities.
Jameson, G. (2008). Technical basis of Austroads guide to pavement technology, part 2: pavement structural design.
Jameson, G., B. Vuong, M. Moffatt, A. Martin, and S. Lourensz. (2010). Assessment of rut-resistance of granular bases using the repeated load triaxial test.
Lekarp, F., and A. Dawson. (1998). “Modelling permanent deformation behaviour of unbound granular materials.” Construction and building materials 12(1): 9–18.
Lekarp, F., U. Isacsson, and A. Dawson. (2000). “State of the art. II: Permanent strain response of unbound aggregates.” Journal of transportation engineering 126(1): 76–83.
Maghvan, S. V., R. Imam, and J. S. McCartney. (2019). “Relative density effects on the bearing capacity of unsaturated sand.” Soils and Foundations 59(5): 1280–1291.
Mamlouk, M. S., and J. P. Zaniewski. (2006). Materials for civil and construction engineers, Pearson Prentice Hall Upper Saddle River, NJ, USA.
Meng, J., J. Huang, D. Sheng, and S. Sloan. (2017). “Granular contact dynamics with elastic bond model.” Acta Geotechnica 12: 479–493.
Nagabhushana, M., D. Tiwari, and P. Jain. (2013). “Rutting in flexible pavement: an approach of evaluation with accelerated pavement testing facility.” Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences 104: 149–157.
Papadopoulos, E. (2014). Performance of unbound aggregate bases and implications for inverted base pavements, Georgia Institute of Technology.
Salour, F., and S. Erlingsson. (2015). “Resilient modulus modelling of unsaturated subgrade soils: laboratory investigation of silty sand subgrade.” Road Materials and Pavement Design 16(3): 553–568.
Seed, H. B., and I. M. Idriss. (1971). “Simplified procedure for evaluating soil liquefaction potential.” Journal of the Soil Mechanics and Foundations division 97(9): 1249–1273.
Shabani, F., and F. Kaviani-Hamedani. (2023). “Cyclic response of sandy subsoil layer under traffic-induced principal stress rotations: Application of bidirectional simple shear apparatus.” Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 164: 107573.
Su, K., C. Wang, G. Zhou, and L. Sun. (2008). “Rutting prediction model for asphalt concrete pavements based on accelerated pavement test.” Journal of Tongji University (Natural Science) 36(4): 493–497.
Wu, T., T. Zhang, C. Gu, J. Wang, Y. Cai, H. Sun, and Z. Yuan. (2022). “Cyclic Behavior of Saturated Clays in Plane Strain State.” Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering 148(1): 04021172.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
History
Published online: Feb 22, 2024
ASCE Technical Topics:
- Construction materials
- Continuum mechanics
- Deformation (mechanics)
- Engineering materials (by type)
- Engineering mechanics
- Geomechanics
- Geotechnical engineering
- Granular materials
- Gravels
- Infrastructure
- Material mechanics
- Materials engineering
- Pavement condition
- Pavement rutting
- Pavements
- Plane strain
- Soil deformation
- Soil mechanics
- Soil properties
- Soil stress
- Solid mechanics
- Strain
- Structural mechanics
- Transportation engineering
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.