Experimental review on the effective stress equation in sand–EPS mixtures

Abstract

ABSTRACT Employing Expanded PolyStyrene, EPS has become common in the construction industry, however, their compressibility creates complexities in effective stress analysis. In this paper, the compressibility of EPS beads and the overall compressibility of sand–EPS beads mixtures have been evaluated. Drained and undrained one-dimensional compression tests along with CD and CU triaxial tests were performed on the mixtures to evaluate the classic effective stress equation. Modified versions of the effective stress equation were applied to results and pore pressure correction factors were obtained from both data series based on two different effective stress analysis approaches (volume change and shear strength related) and compared. Results showed that the two sets of correction factors are consistent. Therefore, correction factors obtained based on the compressibility parameters of the mixtures can be used in the effective stress analysis of CU triaxial tests. Pore pressure factors obtained from the oedometer data were used to analyze results of CU triaxial tests. It is shown that a better agreement between CD and CU stress path results is obtained when the EPS compressibility is considered, leading to similar effective strength parameters in both conditions.