Soils and Foundations
Soils and Foundations
5 years ago

Onset of suffusion in gap-graded soils under upward seepage

Suffusion is an important mechanism that leads to the failure of hydraulic structures such as dams and levees. To evaluate the onset conditions, i.e., the critical hydraulic gradient of the suffusion, a set of laboratory experiments is conducted to explore the internal erosion behaviors under upward seepage conditions. During these experiments, the particle erosion in soils with different particle size distributions and dry densities is investigated. Based on the results of the experiments, a low critical hydraulic gradient (LCHG) and a high critical hydraulic gradient (HCHG) are defined corresponding to the local moving and the global loss of fine particles, respectively. The results show that these two critical hydraulic gradients are significantly influenced by the particle size distribution and the dry density of the soil. Moreover, the experiments reveal that the characteristics of the soil, especially the particle size distribution, have a significant impact on the internal instability of the soil. The effects of the particle size distribution and the dry density on the critical hydraulic gradients are then explained using a capillary model, which is built upon the characteristics of the voids in the soil, including the porosity and the void size distribution.

Publisher URL: www.sciencedirect.com/science

DOI: S0038080617301191

You might also like
Discover & Discuss Important Research

Keeping up-to-date with research can feel impossible, with papers being published faster than you'll ever be able to read them. That's where Researcher comes in: we're simplifying discovery and making important discussions happen. With over 19,000 sources, including peer-reviewed journals, preprints, blogs, universities, podcasts and Live events across 10 research areas, you'll never miss what's important to you. It's like social media, but better. Oh, and we should mention - it's free.

  • Download from Google Play
  • Download from App Store
  • Download from AppInChina

Researcher displays publicly available abstracts and doesn’t host any full article content. If the content is open access, we will direct clicks from the abstracts to the publisher website and display the PDF copy on our platform. Clicks to view the full text will be directed to the publisher website, where only users with subscriptions or access through their institution are able to view the full article.