Yoshihiro Yokota

Numerical Simulation of Soil Structures Reinforced by Geosynthetics

The behavior of soil structure reinforced by geosynthetics is governed by the mechanical interaction of soils and geosynthetics materials. In a numeric simulation of such soil structure behavior, appropriate modeling of the mechanical interaction is required. In this chapter, the numerical modeling of the geosynthetics-reinforcement mechanism in soil structures is described. The confining effect brought about by geosynthetics working so as to prevent dilation of soils is considered using elasto-plastic constitutive models that can express dilation of soils with shear. The deformation–failure behavior of two full-scale, geosynthetics-reinforced soil structures were simulated using the finite element computation technique. The compacted materials actually used were sands, but herein the compacted soils are treated as if they are clays saturated and heavily overconsolidated; and a determination procedure for input parameters needed in these models is proposed. Last, numerically predicted and monitored behavior are compared.

A Test Construction of Vertical Retaining Wall Reinforced with Geogrid

The authors carried out a large scale of test embankment where a vertical retaining wall of concrete blocks was used and the backfill was reinforced with geogrid. The height of retaining wall is 5m. This paper reports the results of monitoring the lateral displacements of the retaining wall, strains produced on the geogrid, and so on.Without any trouble, 40 days have passed since the embankment was completed. At the present stage, the lateral displacement of retaining wall measured is about 10cm (including the displacement during construction) at the very outside and the strain on geogrid is about 1%. These results show that our construction method proposed can be successfully applied to actual structures.