Effective Shear Strength Parameters of Remoulded Residual Soil

Asmaa Gheyath Salih

Department of Geotechnical Engineering, Faculty of Civil Engineering, University Technology Malaysia, Malaysia e-mail: asmaa_g_s@yahoo.com

Khairul Anuar Kassim

Geotechnical & Transportation Department, Faculty of Civil Engineering, University Technology Malaysia, Malaysia e-mail: kanuar@utm.my

ABSTRACT
Lots of s oils geotechnical characteristics involved in the construction problems. Soil will eventually reach failure and de forming excessively when it is s ubjected to gradually increasing load. This failure is related to th e shear strength which is considered as one of the most important engineering properties of the soil. This research focused on comparison of effective shear strength parameters (c', ') that obtained from both CU and CD triaxial tests for remoulded residual soil (silt). This paper presents a reduction factor that helps to evaluate the effective internal friction angle of CD test from the results of CU test. The reduction factor is in the range of 0.89 to 0.92 that came as a resu lt of our study to samp les of residual soil with deferent initial water co ntent. The initial water co ntent had an influence in triaxial compression testing on the soil strength; soil effective cohesion became higher in the range of (11% up to 29 %) wh en initial water con tent changed from 5 3% to 43%, and soil effective friction angle would increase by (3% up to 6%).

KEYWORDS:

Effective shear strength parameters, residual soil, triaxial compression tests, initial water content.

INTRODUCTION
Soils behavior is co mplex because it is heavily dependent on numerous facto rs. Strength of soil is the result of the resistance to the movement (failure) of molecules connected with ea ch other, thus failure is relat ed to the shear strengt h which is one of the most important engineering properties of a soil. Shear strength of a soil is the maximum load that can be supported by the soil mass before it y ields. Therefore, in geotechnical engineering, soil shear strength is an im portant property to evaluate for many cases, such as foundations, retaining walls, earth slopes, and road - 243 -

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bases. For that, an unde rstanding of soil prop erties in the c onstruction site enabling the geotechnical structures design more easy, safe and economic. Soil shear strength derived from two main components of the resistance to prevent the sliding friction between the partic les and the c ohesion between particles. It is al so affected by moisture content, pore pressure, disturbance of the struct ure, the ground water level f luctuations, stress history, time and environmental conditions (Cernica, 1995). The characteristic of residual soils is not well understood due to their extremely heterogeneous nature and difficult to sample and test Nithiaraj et al, (1996). Residual soils are t hose that form fro m weathering of rock or accumulation of organic material and remain at the place where they were formed (Streckeisen, 1967). Townsend (1985) states that residual soil is th e result of chemical weathering and thus the characteristics of engine ering residual soil depends on climatic fa ctors, raw materials, topography, flow and age. Study in Malaysia by Todo et al. (1990, 1994) tells that the soil shear strength in Malaysia is i n the range of 30-20 kPa. In general, effective stress parameter s for granite residual soils reported in past publications at tested locations were ranged between c' = 7 77 kPa and ' = 17 40o. The water content of soil is one of the basic physical character indexes, which reflects the dry or wet state of soil. With the changing of water content the soil mechanics characters may change a lot. In general, when the water conten t increases; soil strength will decrease. The influence of water content on clay and silty soil mechanics characters is obviously noticed Guo, Y. (2009). However, this research studied the influence of water content of the effective shear strength and focused on a com parison between CU and CD t riaxial tests results in term of effective shear strength parameters of re sidual soil. These tow type of tests were perfor med on re moulded samples of silt.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

When the effective shea r strength para meters c 'and ' are de termined, saturation of the specimen is required. For that, triaxial compression test is a common method to measure effective shear strength parameters . By Fookes (1997), the high pressure needed in the process of saturation of specimens can increase soil moisture content and saturation level so cause the value of c' is reduced due to reduction in soil suction. However by Bressani and Vaughan (1989) ; the value of ' is not affected by soil saturation. Brand (1982) stated that the effective cohesion (c') is measured very small. The tests material was silty soil. Samples were remoulded after collected from UTM area at depth between 1.5 to 2.5 m below the ground surface. Effective shear strength parameters were obtained from triaxial compression tests of two ty pes: saturated consolidated drained (CD) tes t and saturated consolidated undrained ( CU) test with pore water pressure measurement. Physical parameters of residual soil are showed in Table 1.

Vol. 17 [2012], Bund. C V . Table 1: Depth and phy D ysical parame eters of residu soil ual
Param meters Depth (m) h Natural Moistur Content (%) N re Specific Gravity (Gs) Mg/m3 y Liquid Li imit (%) Plastic Li imit (%) Plastic Ind (%) dex Soil Classifica ation (USCS) value 1.5 2. .5 26.48 2.59 68.4 42.8 25.6 M High plast MH: ticity silt.

24 45

Preparation of the Sa o amples (Remould ding the Soil)

The sample was prepared with remoul T w lded sampler equipment under initial consolidatio r l on pressu ures of 100 and 200 kPa, then were c ut and trim m by trimm a u med ming equipment. Cylindrical sampl had been prepared with diameter and height of 38 mm and 76 mm respectiv les p h d 8 vely.

Figure 1: Remolded sa R ampler equip pment to prep pare samples of 38mm d s diameter and 76 mm heigh 7 ht.
The samples were tested by conducting triaxial co m T w b g mpression tes for both t y st ypes; saturate ed conso olidated drain test ( CD) and undrain (CU) t est with pore w ned ned water pressure measuremen e nt accord ding to BS 1377: Part 8:1990; Shear Strength T 8 r Tests (effectiv stress). Th drawing o ve he of effect stress fail tive lure envelope needs to test at least thre samples. Fo that, sampl were teste e t ee or les ed

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under three different confining pressures 50, 100 and 150 kPa. All sam ples were sheared with a constant strain rate of 0.5 mm/min.

Figure 2: Triaxial cells filled with water for saturation stage.

TEST RESULTS AND ANALYSIS

Consolidated undrained (CU) tests are usually preferred over consolidated-drained (CD) tests for determining the effective stress f ailure envelope for clay s, because consolidated undrained tests can be perform ed more quickly. The time required for non uniform pore water pressures to equalize in t he specimen in a consoli dated undrained test is less than t he time required for a specimen to fully drain during shear in a consolidated drained test. Complete drainage is allowed during the application of the shear for consolidated drained loading. Different criteria can be used to define the point of "failure" in a stre ss-strain curve of a particu lar material. Failure and yield should not be confused. There is no unique way of defining failure. For some material failure can be assumed to be the y ield point. For soils, "failu re" is usually considered occurring at 15% to 20% strain. In this sense, the shear strength of soils can be defined as the maximum stress applied on any plane in a soil m ass at so me strain considered as "failure". By plotting the effectiv e stresses at f ailure from Consolidated drained and undrained tests, the Mohr- Coulomb failure envelope for effective stresses (c' and ') were determined.

Triaxial Compression Test Results (Effective Parameters c' and ')

Both CU and CD triaxial t ests were carried out on six sa mples that prepared with remoulded sampler equipment under initial consolidation pressure of 100 Kpa , thus samples had a density of

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about 1.8 Mg/m3 and an initial water content of about 53%. Fig.1and 2 show curves of effective stress failure envelope, deviator stress vs. axia l strain and pore water press ure vs. axial strain respectively.

(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 3: Relations of effective stress failure envelope of CU test (for samples remoulded under 100 kPa pressure), deviator stress vs. axial strain and pore water pressure vs. axial strain.

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(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 4: Relations of effective stress failure envelope of CD test (for samples remoulded under 100 kPa pressure), deviator stress vs. axial strain and pore water pressure vs. axial strain. CU and CD triaxial tests were also carried out on other samples that prepared under initial consolidation pressure of 200 Kpa. In this time, samples had a density of about 1.9 Mg/m3 and an initial water content of about 43%; this co mes according to t he initial consolidation pressur e increment. Fig.3 and 4 show curves of effective stress failure envelope, deviator stress vs. axial strain and pore water pressure vs. axial strain respectively.

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(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 5: Relations of effective stress failure envelope of CU test (for samples remoulded under 200 kPa pressure), deviator stress vs. axial strain and pore water pressure vs. axial strain.

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(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 6: Relations of effective stress failure envelope of CD test (for samples remoulded under
200 kPa pressure), deviator stress vs. axial strain and pore water pressure vs. axial strain. In general, the effective internal friction a ngles of the residual soil that deter mined from triaxial compression test were in the range of 28 o to 32o and for the effective cohesions were from 8 to 13 kPa. With triaxial testing, initial water content can affect the soil mass strength. Due to the increasing of rem oulding (initial consolidation) pressure; the soil mass became stronger an d its effective shear strength became higher, this comes according to the less initial water content and a higher mass density. That can be explained as th e soil particles interlocking and connections

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became more closely which would increase the soil strength. Reducing initial water content by 10% (from 53% to 43%), that would increase soil ef fective cohesion by (11% up to 29 %), and for soil effective friction angle would increase by (3% up to 6%).

Comparison between CU and CD Tests Results in Term of Effective Parameters (c', ')
It is well established that strength behavior is highly dependent on the previous strain history of the soil st ructure, mode of i mposed shear and the drainage condition (Terzaghi et at. 19 96). Theoretically, for normally consolidated clays; the effective shear strength parameters (c', ') that obtained from consolidated drained tests and undr ained tests with pore pressure measurement are identical. Practically, the effective shea r strength parameters (c', ') for CD and CU test s are not identical because of the different nature of the two types of test. Similar behavior was also shown by Ting and Ooi (1976). When comparing this research re sults of CU triaxial test ( with pore water pressure measurement) with CD test; we found t hat results of CU test is higher than results obtained from CD test in term of effective parameter (c', ') for this type of silty soil. These results agreed with previous studies of (Taha, 1998). His study on CH soil "clay with high plasticity" shows that the effective friction angle was 28.1o for CD test and 30.9 o for CU test. Also the soil cohesion was 10 kPa for CD and 15 kPa for CU test. Thus for the effective friction angle; we can obtain a ratio of a reduction factor betwe en CU and C D tests results which is in the range of 0.89 t o 0.92 so, that can be use as a reduction factor to obtain CD test results from CU test in term of effective friction angle due to easy access to the CU test with less time, effort and cost. Table 2: Triaxial tests results summary Triaxial test type Sample remoulding pressure
100 kPa 200 kPa

Initial water content w (%)

53 43

Consolidated Undrained c' kPa

10.17 13.11

Consolidated Drained c' kPa

8.13 9.04

' o
31.65 32.37

' o
28.17 29.79

CONCLUSIONS
Effective shear strength parameters of soils are the fundamental strength parameters. Thes e parameters are not soil constants; they depend strongly on the moisture content of the soil. Samples that remoulded at a higher pressure (less initial moisture content) gave bigger effective shear strength than that remoulded at a lower pressure (more initial moisture content). Results of CU test is higher than the results obtained from CD test in term of the effectiv e shear strength parameters (c', '). However, Triaxial CD test gives more reliable data that idealize the soil behavior in the real situation t han that of CU test, on the other hand; CD test is more expensive and also needs longer time to perform . For that, this project study gives a reduction factor that helps to evaluate the effective internal friction angle of CD test from the results of CU test. This reduction factor is in the range of 0.89 to 0.92.

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