Liquefaction behavior of dredged silty-fine sands under cyclic loading for land reclamation: laboratory experiment and numerical simulation

Abstract

Medium-coarse sands (CS) were dredged and exhausted in land reclamation. However, the remaining silty-fine sands (FS) were wasted. The liquefaction behavior of dredged silty-FS and the possibility of utilizing the remaining silty-FS as dredger fill source for land reclamation should be investigated. Cyclic consolidation-undrained triaxial tests were performed to investigate the liquefaction resistance of dredged silty-FS under different influencing factors. The cyclic stress ratio (CSR) of dredged silty-FS increased with the increase in initial relative density and consolidation stress ratio and decreased with the increase in silt content and consolidation stress. The CSR first decreased with the increase in clay content up to a threshold value and increased with the increase in clay content. A regression model was created to estimate the relationship between CSR and silt content, clay content, initial relative density, consolidation stress, consolidation stress ratio, and cyclic resistance ratio. Response surface methodology (RSM) was employed to investigate the mutual influence among the five independent variables. On the basis of cyclic triaxial tests, particle flow code models were introduced to investigate the microscopic internal fabric changes of dredged silty-FS and the influence of extended factors on liquefaction. The average microscopic contact force and coordination number between particles controlled the macroscopic mechanical behavior of sands. Sand liquefaction was due to the cumulative loss of coordination number under cyclic loading. The average contact force between particles was linearly decreased to 0 and the coordination number sharply decreased when the sample reached initial liquefaction. On the basis of numerical tests, CSR increased with the increase in D50 and vibration frequency. The influence of vibration frequency was relatively small. In addition, the CS–FS and CS–FS–CS combination layers showed greater liquefaction resistance than the FS layer. In the filling process, the interbed of FS and CS improved the liquefaction resistance of dredged silty-FS to a certain extent.