Abstract
Experimental investigations on model counterfort retaining walls have been carried out to study the lateral movement of the walls and the nature of the failure modes. Mild steel plates of size 1,000 × 900 × 8 mm were used as model retaining walls and were placed in a tank of size 900 × 900 × 670 mm. Ennore sand, obtained from Madras India, and Fly ash, obtained from Panki Thermal Power Plant, India were used as backfill material. Tests were carried out both with and without reinforced backfill. Two types of loading conditions were applied: (i) line load and (ii) uniform surcharge. The shape and size of the failure wedge was studied by observing displacement of bands of colored through a Perspex plate fixed on one side of the tank. Plots of overturning moment against the rotation of a wall top show that with the increase in rotation of wall, the overturning moment decreases. The minimum value of overturning moment is taken as the limiting value. The failure surfaces obtained in different cases are linear and parabolic in shape.
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Abbreviations
- H:
-
Height of the retaining wall
- c:
-
Cohesion of the backfill
- ϕ:
-
Angle of the internal friction of the backfill
- Cu :
-
Uniformity coefficient of the backfill
- Cc :
-
Coefficient of curvature of the backfill
- δ:
-
Angle of internal friction between geotextile and sand
- Sx :
-
Horizontal spacing between reinforcing strips
- Sz :
-
Vertical spacing between reinforcing strips
- M:
-
Overturning moment
- DP :
-
Non-dimensional spacing co-efficient
- DC :
-
Non-dimensional co-efficient for adhesion
- ka :
-
Co-efficient of active earth pressure
- L:
-
Total length of reinforcing strip
- θ:
-
Wedge angle with vertical
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Hazra, S., Patra, N.R. Performance of Counterfort Walls with Reinforced Granular and Fly Ash Backfills: Experimental Investigation. Geotech Geol Eng 26, 259–267 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-007-9162-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-007-9162-3