Stress‐History‐Based Model for Ge of Cohesionless soils

Abstract

An empirical, stress‐history‐based model for the small strain (or elastic) shear modulus Ge of cohesionless soils has been developed. Various sands were tested in an 18 cm diameter oedometer equipped with lateral‐stress measuring capabilities and bender elements for propagating and recording elastic waves through the specimens. While previous efforts have found Ge scaling with approximately the 1/2 power of confining stress (n=0.5), the present work shows n on virgin loading n1 ranging from 0.39 to 0.72. Furthermore, n1 was shown to be related to the maximum dimensionless stiffness coefficient for 1‐D strain (S1Dmax). The values of n on unloading and reloading nu displayed a much narrower range than nl. The average value of nu was 0.38, a value much closer to the theoretical n=1/3 for perfect spheres. This is attributed to the smaller changes in number and quality of intergranular contacts during unloading and reloading than during virgin compression. The developed model for Ge includes overconsolidation ...