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Undrained Cyclic and Monotonic Strength of Sand-Silt Mixtures

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Abstract

In an attempt to correlate the monotonic peak strength and the cyclic strength of sand-silt mixtures over a wide range of parameters and to clarify some of the existing confusing conclusions in the literature regarding the undrained strength response of sand-silt mixtures, a series of stress controlled cyclic and strain controlled monotonic triaxial tests was carried out on sand-silt mixture specimens of 50 mm diameter and 100 mm height with varying silt content. In these experiments, various measures of sample density was adopted through different approaches such as constant gross void ratio approach, constant relative density approach, constant sand skeleton void ratio approach, and constant interfine void ratio approach. Also the effect of relative density and confining pressure on these strengths was studied. It is observed that the limiting fines content and the relative density of a specimen play the key role in deciding the cyclic and monotonic resistance of sand-silt mixtures when studied through any approach. For any silt content with relative density more than 70%, cyclic and monotonic resistances are observed to be independent of silt content. When the undrained cyclic strengths of these specimens are plotted against their respective undrained monotonic peak strengths, it is observed that there exists a definite exponential relationship between the two with an excellent correlation coefficient. An expression is proposed in this regard to help engineers assess the cyclic strength of sand-silt mixtures from monotonic test results.

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Abbreviations

B:

Skempton’s pore pressure parameter

Conf Pr:

Confining pressure

CSR:

Cyclic stress ratio

CRR:

Cyclic resistance ratio

CGVR:

Constant gross void ratio

CIVR:

Constant interfine void ratio

CRD:

Constant relative density

CSSVR:

Constant sand skeleton void ratio

D 50 :

Mean grain size

e :

Gross void ratio

e c :

Post consolidation gross void ratio

e f :

Interfine void ratio

e max :

Maximum gross void ratio

e min :

Minimum gross void ratio

e s :

Sand skeleton void ratio

f :

Frequency

FC :

Fines content

G f :

Specific gravity of fines

G s :

Specific gravity of sand

γ d :

Dry density

γ dc :

Post consolidation dry density

γ w :

Unit weight of water

LFC :

Limiting fines content

N :

Cycles of loading

ND:

Not determinable

NP:

Nonplastic

N L :

Cycles to initial liquefaction

p′ :

Mean effective stress

q :

Deviator stress

RD :

Relative density

RD c :

Post consolidation relative density

SP:

Poorly graded sand

ML:

Inorganic silts and very fine sands

σ dc :

Deviator stress

\( \sigma_{3c}^{\prime } \) :

Effective confining pressure

S cyc :

Undrained cyclic strength

S pk :

Undrained monotonic peak strength

V :

Volume of the specimen

V V :

Volume of voids

V S :

Volume of soil solids

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Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided by Ministry of Earth Sciences, formerly Department of Science and Technology (Seismology Division), Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India for the work reported in this technical paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Civil Engineering, College of Engineering and Technology (CET), Biju Patnaik University of Technology (BPUT), Bhubaneswar, Orissa, 751 003, India

    H. K. Dash

  2. Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, 560 012, India

    T. G. Sitharam

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Correspondence to H. K. Dash.

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Dash, H.K., Sitharam, T.G. Undrained Cyclic and Monotonic Strength of Sand-Silt Mixtures. Geotech Geol Eng 29, 555–570 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-011-9403-3

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