Identifier

etd-0708103-120755

Degree

Master of Science in Civil Engineering (MSCE)

Department

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

Soil reinforcement interaction is a key issue in the design of reinforced soil structures. Therefore, it is important to analyze the pull-out mechanism, and to evaluate the interaction between the soil and geosynthetic reinforcement. Majority of pull-out tests performed to date were in granular soils, and very few tests were reported in cohesive soils. The shortage of in-situ granular materials and the availability of cohesive soils in Louisiana have initiated a growing interest in using the marginal soils as backfill material. To investigate the soil-geosynthetic interaction parameters, series of laboratory and field pull-out tests were conducted using various geosynthetics (geogrids: UX750, UX1500, UX1700, Stratagrid-500, and geotextiles: Woven (4x4), Woven (6x6) and Non-woven) with different lengths under various confining pressures. This research program is based on the analysis of the pull-out tests, which includes (i) the comparison of laboratory and field pull-out tests, (ii) the contribution of passive bearing resistance to the total pull-out resistance, (iii) the evaluation of coefficient of interaction (Ci), and (iv) the evaluation of the scale correction factor (α). The results of this study indicate that (i) the laboratory and field pull-out test results are close to each other and show more consistency for high strength geosynthetics compared to weak strength geosynthetics, (ii) the contribution of passive bearing resistance ranges from 5-30 percent of the total pull-out resistance, (iii) the coefficient of interaction (Ci) ranged from 0.5 to 1.0 for laboratory tests and 0.3 to 1.2 for field pull-out tests, and decreases with increasing length and increasing confining pressure, and (iv) the scale correction factor (α) values estimated for the geogrids ranges from 0.32 to 0.82.

Date

2003

Document Availability at the Time of Submission

Release the entire work immediately for access worldwide.

Committee Chair

Mehmet Tumay

DOI

10.31390/gradschool_theses.3621

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