Modeling the Dynamic Response of Wrap-Faced Reinforced Soil Retaining Walls
Publication: International Journal of Geomechanics
Volume 12, Issue 4
Abstract
This paper describes the development of a numerical model for simulating the shaking table tests on wrap-faced reinforced soil retaining walls. Some of the physical model tests carried out on reinforced soil retaining walls subjected to dynamic excitation through uniaxial shaking tests are briefly discussed. Models of retaining walls are constructed in a perspex box with geotextile reinforcement using the wraparound technique with dry sand backfill and instrumented with displacement sensors, accelerometers, and soil pressure sensors. Results showed that the displacements decrease with the increase in number of reinforcement layers, whereas acceleration amplifications were not affected significantly. Numerical modeling of these shaking table tests is carried out using the Fast Lagrangian Analysis of Continua program. The numerical model is validated by comparing the results with experiments on physical models. Responses of wrap-faced walls with varying numbers of reinforcement layers are compared. Sensitivity analysis performed on the numerical models showed that the friction and dilation angle of backfill material and stiffness properties of the geotextile-soil interface are the most affecting parameters for the model response.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
International Journal of Geomechanics
Volume 12 • Issue 4 • August 2012
Pages: 439 - 450
Copyright
© 2012. American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Jun 30, 2010
Accepted: Mar 4, 2011
Published online: Mar 7, 2011
Published in print: Aug 1, 2012
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