Experimental study on shear strength of saturated remolded loess

PLoS One. 2022 Jul 14;17(7):e0271266. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0271266. eCollection 2022.

Abstract

Loess has the characteristics of large porosity, loose structure, uniform composition and strong collapsibility. When encountering heavy rainfall and irrigation prone to saturation, resulting in loess landslides, roadbed subsidence and dam instability. In order to study the effect of dry density and shear rate on the shear strength of saturated remolded loess, the consolidated undrained (CU) test was carried out in Yan'an City by using SLB-6A stress-strain controlled triaxial shear permeability test instrument. The shear rate, confining pressure and dry density were controlled during the test. The dry densities of the samples were 1.5 g / cm3, 1.6 g / cm3 and 1.7 g / cm3, respectively. CU tests of saturated remolded loess were carried out at different shear rates under the confining pressures of 100 kPa, 150 kPa and 200 kPa, respectively. It is found that the stress-strain curve of saturated remolded loess gradually moves upward with the increase of dry density. With the increase of dry density, the cohesion and internal friction angle of remolded saturated loess samples increase. At the same shear rate, with the increase of dry density, the deviatoric stress of the specimen increases significantly.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Cities
  • Physical Phenomena
  • Refuse Disposal* / methods
  • Shear Strength

Grants and funding

This work was partially supported by the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, CHD (No.300102219213), Project Mechanism of mega loess slope sliding supported by NSFC (No.41790443), Key R&D Program of Shaanxi Province (2018ZDXM-SF-024). The funding organization provided financial support in the form of authors' salaries or research materials.