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Centrifuge Modeling of Soft Soil Reinforced with Granular Columns

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Abstract

This paper presents a geotechnical centrifuge model of an embankment built in stages, over a 6.0 m layer of soft soil reinforced with nine floating granular columns arranged in a 3 × 3 square grid. The container was divided in two compartments where reinforced and unreinforced soil were tested simultaneously for comparison purposes. The load was applied by means of a 4 m high sand embankment (prototype dimensions) built in three steps. For each step, the centrifuge was stopped to allow the placement of the embankment layer and then re-accelerated up to 26 g and the excess of pore pressure was allowed to dissipate after each step. The instrumentation, comprised of total stress cells, pore pressure transducers and displacement transducers, was configured to collect information about the load transfer mechanism between the soil and the instrumented central column for each loading step during pore pressure dissipation. Results showed that despite representing only 30% of the total load, the first step provoked almost 70% of total vertical displacement. Finally, the columns were exhumed for a detailed and comprehensive visual analysis aiming to support and explain the results obtained.

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Abbreviations

su :

Undrained shear strength

σ′v :

Effective vertical stress

OCR:

Over consolidation ratio

g:

Earth’s gravity acceleration

n:

Vertical stress concentration factor

Δσ v(col) :

Increment of vertical stress on the column

Δσ v(soil) :

Increment of vertical stress in the soil

β:

Settlement reduction factor

Ac :

Area of the column

Aa :

Area of soil cell

Δu:

Increment of excess of pore pressure

e0 :

Initial void ratio

emin :

Minimum void ratio

emax :

Maximum void ratio

DR:

Relative density

D10 :

Equivalent 10% grain soil diameter passing by weight

∅crit :

Critical shear strength friction angle

cc :

Compression index

cs :

Swelling index

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Acknowledgements

The Authors are grateful to Rio de Janeiro Research Agency FAPERJ and Federal Scholarship Agency CAPES for funding this research.

Funding

Fundação Carlos Chagas Filho de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (Grant No. 101.240/2014).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Civil Engineering, UENF, Campos Dos Goytacazes, RJ, Brazil

    Fernando Saboya, Sérgio Tibana, Rodrigo Martins Reis & Thamara Fonte-Boa

  2. Graduate School of Engineering, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, COPPE, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil

    Marcio de Souza Soares de Almeida

  3. Military Institute of Engineering - IME, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, Brazil

    Maria Esther Soares Marques

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  1. Fernando Saboya
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  2. Sérgio Tibana
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Correspondence to Fernando Saboya.

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The Authors declare that this manuscript has no conflict of interest and that the data from the tests presented herein are available in http://uenf.br/posgraduacao/engenharia-civil/dissertacoes-de-mestrado/.

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Saboya, F., Tibana, S., Reis, R.M. et al. Centrifuge Modeling of Soft Soil Reinforced with Granular Columns. Geotech Geol Eng 39, 2955–2967 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-020-01671-1

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