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Title:

Modeling and Prediction of the Effects of Moisture on the Unconfined Compressive and Tensile Strength of Soils

Accession Number:

01476358

Record Type:

Component

Availability:

Transportation Research Board Business Office

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Abstract:

Unconfined compressive strength (UCS) and tensile strength are two important geomaterial parameters that are used for performance prediction and design criteria. Both UCS and tensile strength are affected by moisture content and thus the characterization of their dependence on moisture content is of paramount importance. The unified effective stress theory proposed by Lu and Likos based on the suction stress enables the characterization of soils under both saturated and unsaturated conditions with one closed-form equation. This theory was verified by triaxial and shear test results for relatively high moisture contents and, therefore, low suction levels (typically more than -700 kPa). Using two types of soils, the current study presented in this paper provides experimental verification of this effective stress theory via indirect tensile (IDT) and UCS tests, both of which are widely used in pavement engineering. The verification is extended in this study to low moisture contents ranging from 2.56% to 18.9% and high matric suction levels ranging from 600 kPa to 16,000 kPa, which are the typical ranges for the base, sub-base, and subgrade layers in pavements. A new method is proposed to predict a soil’s UCS and tensile strength at specified moisture contents by taking simple soil water characteristic curve (SWCC) measurements and conducting UCS and IDT tests at two unsaturated moisture contents, which is experimentally validated in this paper. On the other side, the IDT strength and UCS at a few different moisture contents can be used to obtain the parameters α and n of SWCCs to avoid time-consuming SWCC measurements.

Supplemental Notes:

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AFP60 Engineering Behavior of Unsaturated Soils.

Monograph Accession #:

01470560

Report/Paper Numbers:

13-4111

Language:

English

Corporate Authors:

Transportation Research Board

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Authors:

Li, Xiaojun
Wen, Haifang
Muhunthan, Balasingam
Wang, Jingan

Pagination:

16p

Publication Date:

2013

Conference:

Transportation Research Board 92nd Annual Meeting

Location: Washington DC, United States
Date: 2013-1-13 to 2013-1-17
Sponsors: Transportation Research Board

Media Type:

Digital/other

Features:

Figures; Photos; References; Tables

Subject Areas:

Geotechnology; Highways; Pavements; I42: Soil Mechanics

Source Data:

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2013 Paper #13-4111

Files:

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Created Date:

Feb 5 2013 12:48PM