Modeling Unsaturated Soil Response under Suction-Controlled True Triaxial Stress Paths
Publication: International Journal of Geomechanics
Volume 12, Issue 3
Abstract
Results from a comprehensive series of suction-controlled hydrostatic compression, conventional triaxial compression, triaxial compression, triaxial extension, and simple shear tests, conducted on statically compacted specimens of poorly graded sand with clay, are presented. The experiments were accomplished in a newly developed true triaxial apparatus to test cubical, 7.62 cm (3 in.) side, specimens of unsaturated soil under controlled-suction states and for a wide range of stress paths that are not readily achievable in a cylindrical cell. The key features of the apparatus and a thorough performance verification test program have been documented in a first companion paper. Results from suction-controlled tests performed in the present work were used to calibrate and further validate two of the most popular elastoplastic critical state-based frameworks postulated to date for unsaturated soils, namely, the Barcelona Basic Model and the Oxford Model. In general, predictions of unsaturated soil response from either model are shown to be reasonably accurate, highlighting their potential for use in computational analyses of geotechnical boundary-value problems that involve geosystems made of compacted soil or resting on unsaturated ground.
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Acknowledgments
Development of the cubical test cell utilized in this experimental and modeling effort was accomplished under U.S. National Science Foundation Award #CMS-0216545. This support is gratefully acknowledged. Any findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NSF. The authors also would like to thank Dr. Arthit Laikram and Mr. Jae Hyun Park, former graduate students at UT-Arlington, for all their assistance during the initial calibration testing.
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Information
Published In
International Journal of Geomechanics
Volume 12 • Issue 3 • June 2012
Pages: 292 - 308
Copyright
© 2012. American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Nov 11, 2010
Accepted: Jul 8, 2011
Published online: Jul 11, 2011
Published in print: Jun 1, 2012
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