Abstract
Although geocells have been extensively used to improve the performance of road embankments and slopes, their positive effect on shear strength under various shear failure scenarios has not been sufficiently emphasized. This paper attempts to fill this research gap through a series of numerical studies and presents ongoing research. First, FLAC3D is adopted to simulate two large-scale direct shear tests, and the outcomes are compared with laboratory test results reported in the literature. Then, the layout of the geocell in the shear box, the angle between the geocell layer and the shear plane, and the aspect ratio of the geocells are investigated to analyze the effects of each factor on the shear strength of the geocell-reinforced layer. The findings confirm that the geocell-reinforced layer exhibits substantial anisotropy, which is caused by variations in the shear failure plane. When the shear plane is near the center of the geocell, or the angle between the shear plane and the horizontal plane is less than 45 degrees, the geocells can provide higher shear strength. The shear strength of the geocell-reinforced layer can also be improved by increasing the aspect ratio or geocell height, where the apparent cohesiveness and friction angle are increased by 156% and 13%, respectively, over a range of aspect ratios from 0.394 to 1.575.
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Acknowledgments
The research described in this paper was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 42077262, 42077261, and 41972294), the Sichuan Transportation Science and Technology Project (No. KJFZ-2022Y-022), the 2022 Annual Transportation Industry Science and Technology Project (Nos. 2022-ZD-017, and 2022-ZD-018), and the Research Fund Project of Xinjiang Transportation Planning Survey and Design Institute Co., Ltd. (Nos. KY2022042504, and KY2022042501). In addition, the first author, Yang Zhao wants to thank Juan Li and Guan-lin Zhao for the great support of his scientific studies during those dark days.
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Zhao, Y., Lu, Z., Liu, J. et al. Numerical Study on Shear Behavior of Geocell-reinforced Layer Based on Large-scale Direct Shear Tests. KSCE J Civ Eng (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12205-024-2458-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12205-024-2458-5