In-Situ Soil Testing

Abstract

In-situ soil testing is an essential part of geotechnical engineering. While many devices have been developed over the years for measuring soil properties in-situ, the pressuremeter and the cone penetrometer (CPT) are arguably the two most widely used in-situ soil testing devices. Unlike many laboratory tests, pressuremeter and CPT tests are indirect tests in that the measured data needs to be interpreted to give fundamental soil properties. Due to similar mechanical action generated by cavity expansion and cone penetration and pressuremeter expansion, cavity expansion theory has been used with considerable success in the interpretation of these two types of in-situ soil tests (e.g. Wroth, 1984, Clarke, 1995, Yu and Mitchell, 1998; Lunne et al., 1997). The purpose of this chapter is to summarise some key applications of cavity expansion solutions to the interpretation of pressuremeter and CPT tests in both clay and sand.