Geosynthetics

y
and
Reinforced Soil Structures
Reinforced Soil Walls
continued
Prof K
K. Rajagopal
Department of Civil Engineering
IIT Madras, Chennai
e-mail: gopalkr@iitm.ac.in

Outline of the Lecture

Different Standards for Reinforced Soil
Retaining walls
Materials required
Fundamentals of earth pressure theories
Stability Analysis of Reinforced Soil
R t i i Walls
Retaining
W ll

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CodesandDesignStandardsfortheReinforced
Soil Retaining Walls
SoilRetainingWalls

BS 8006 Strengthened/Reinforced Soils and Other Fills,

British Code of Practice (1995 & 2006)
FHWA Mechanically Stabilised Earth Walls and Reinforced
Soil Slopes: Design and Construction Guidelines, FHWANHI 0043 (2001)
NHI-0043
Segmental Retaining Walls, National Concrete Masonry
Association, Herndon, Virginia, USA(2009)
Seismic Analysis and Design of Retaining Walls, Buried
Structures, Slopes, and Embankments, NCHRP National
Cooperative Highway Research Project,
Project Transportation
Research Boads, Washington, DC USA (2008)

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CommentsonDesignCodes
BS 8006-1995
Limit State Based code
Covers both polymeric and metallic reinforcements
Reinforced walls, slopes and Anchored Earth are discussed
elaborately
Seismic Loads are not considered
FHWA NHI-00-0043
Lumped factor of safety approach
Covers metallic and polymeric reinforcement materials, but
not anchored earth
Slightly more tolerant of fine soils
Seismic design
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Major differences between BS 8006

and
d FHWA
BS 8006
BS8006

FHWA

Limit
Limitstate
state
Nocheckfor
overturning and
overturningand
eccentricity
Verticalstress simple
p
staticpressure

Lumped
LumpedFactorofSafety
Factor of Safety
Checksforoverturning
and eccentricity
andeccentricity
Verticalstress
Meyerhoff
y
pressure
p

z ws

Reinforced Soil Walls - 3

Rv

L 2e
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Soil gradation requirements

Percent passing
Particlesize(mm)
125mm
90mm
75mm
37 5
37.5
10mm
5mm
600microns
63microns

BS80061995
100%
80100
65100
45 100
45100
1560
1045
10
45
025
0to12

particlesizeFHWA
102mm
100%
0.425mm
060%
0.075mm
015%
Pl i i i d
Plasticityindex<6%
6%

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Electrochemical properties of soils

Property

criteria

Limits for backfills when using steel reinforcement

Resistivity
>3000Ohmcm
pH
5 10
510
Chlorides
<100ppm
Sulphates
<200ppm
Organiccontent<1%
g
Plasticityindexofsoil<6%
Limits for backfills when using geosynthetic reinforcement
Polyester(PET) pH39
Polyolefin(PP&HDPE)pH>3
Plasticityindexofsoil<6%
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S it bl Type
Suitable
T
off B
Backfill
kfill S
Soils
il
Soil should be granular so that it has good permeability and
less corrosive effects on reinforcements.
Good drainage is essential to minimise the hydrostatic
pressures on the
th retaining
t i i structures.
t t
Soil should have low PI value so that volume changes
during
g the service life are minimal ((both expansive
p
and
contractive)
Soil should not have very large size particles as they are
difficult to compact and installation damage of
geosynthetics could be high.

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Shear Strength Properties

ShearStrengthProperties
Direct
Directshearstrengthvaluesareused
shear strength values are used
Peakfrictionangleisusedforallsteepslopes
and retaining walls
andretainingwalls
Largestrainfrictionangle(constantvolume
fi i
frictionangle)isusedforshallowslopesand
l )i
d f h ll
l
d
soilstructuressupportedonsoftsoils
Cohesionisusuallyneglectedasitgivesan
additionalfactorofsafety
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Sacrificial thickness on each surface due to corrosion

Design service life, Reinforce material Sacrificial thickness, mm
years
Land based
Fresh water
structure
structure
(out of water)
60
B
1 35
1.35
1 68
1.68
G
0.38
0.63
S
0.05
0.09
70
G
0.45
0.7
S
0.05
0.1
120
G
0.75
1.0
S
0.1
0.2
NOTE 1. B black steel (un galvanized); G galvanized steel; S stainless steel.
Black steel should not be used as a reinforcement material for a design service
life greater than 60 years.
NOTE 2. Linear interpolation may be used for intermediate service lives.
NOTE 3.
3 These
Th
values
l
apply
l to
t steels
t l embedded
b dd d in
i fills
fill off class
l
6I
6I, 6J
6J, 7C
7C, 7D
in the Specification for Highway Works [1].
NOTE 4. Sites of special aggressiveness are to be assessed by specific study.

(Extracted from BS 8006-1995)

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Lateral Earth Pressures

LateralEarthPressures
Activeearthpressuresareusedastheyare
ct e ea t p essu es a e used as t ey a e
developedevenatsmallstrains
p
y
Thelateralstressesatshallowdepthsinverytall
structuresmaybeinfluencedmoreby
compaction thesemaybeneartoKo ratherthan
t Ka.
toK
Theabovehappensduetotheincremental
nature of construction of soil structures topof
natureofconstructionofsoilstructures
top of
thewallmaynotdeformmuchascomparedto
thebottom
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Rankine LateralEarthPressures
Lateral Earth Pressures
Horizontal ground surface and smooth vertical wall
Horizontalgroundsurfaceandsmoothverticalwall
Ka

1 sin
1 sin

x K a z 2c K a K a q
Cohesion, c is usually neglected

1
P K a H 2 K a qqH
2
M

H/2

H/3
KaH

Kaq

1
H 1
2 H
3 1

q
H
Ka H
Ka
Ka H
KaqH2
2
3
2 6
2
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Rankiness theory
Rankine
theory SlopedFill
Sloped Fill
Ka

cos cos cos

2

cos cos 2 cos 2

cos

1
P a H 2 cos
2

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Coulombssequation
Coulomb
equation
Ka

sin 2 ( )

sin( ) sin( )
2
sin sin( ) 1

sin(

= back slope angle

= angle at back face of retaining wall
= friction angle of the soil
interface
=
i t f
ffriction
i ti angle
l b
between
t
wallll
and backfill soil

Effect of wall friction is to reduce the active lateral

earth pressures
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Design Loads
Self weight loads
Live loads due to point loads or uniform
surcharge
Horizontal Loads from the crash barrier
Horizontal loads due to breaking forces on
bridge abutments
Vertical loads from Bridge abutments
Seismic loads
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External Stability Calculations

Stability Against Lateral Sliding

Stability against Overturning
Stability Against bearing capacity failure
Slip circle or overall failure mechanism

The length of the reinforced soil block is determined

from these calculations.
For the purpose of external stability calculations, the
reinforced block is treated as a rigid
g block.

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Resistanceforcealongthebase

L t l Slidi F il
LateralSlidingFailureMechanism
M h i
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Overturningmechanismoffailure resistanceduetoself
weightofthereinforcedsoilblock
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Bearingcapacityofsettlementfailuremechanism

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SlipcirclefailureorGlobalfailuremechanism lengthof
reinforcement layers should be large enough so that most critical
reinforcementlayersshouldbelargeenoughsothatmostcritical
slipcirclewillhaveadequatefactorofsafety thisisespecially
criticalforstructuresbuiltonsoftfoundationsoilorstructuresbuilt
onhighslopes
hi h l
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Load combinations in BS 8006

Partial load factors for load combinations associated with walls
Effects
Combinations
A
B
C
Mass of the reinforced soil body
1.5
1
1
Mass of the backfill on top of the
1.5
1
1
reinforced soil wall
Earth pressure behind the structure 1.5
1.5
1
Traffic load on reinforced soil block Fq=1.5
Fq=0.0
Fq=0
and behind reinforced soil block
Fq=1.5
=1 5
Fq=1.5
=1 5
Fq=0

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Partial load factors for load combinations for bridge abutment walls
Effects
Combinations
A
B
C
Dead load of the structure
1.5
1
1
Dead load of the fill on top of the
1.5
1
1
structure
Dead load of bridge and bank seat
1.2
1.0
1
Backfill pressure behind the bank seat 1.5
1.5
1
Backfill pressure behind the structure 1.5
1.5
1
Horizontal loads due to creep and
12
1.2
12
1.2
1
shrinkage
Traffic Loading
Over the
Behind
entire
reinforced
structure
zone
Fq=1.5
Fq=1.5
Bridge
dge vertical
e t ca live
e load
oad HA
Fq=1.5
q 5
Fq=1.5
q 5
HA & HB
Fq=1.3
Fq=1.3
Breaking dynamic load
HA
Fq=1.25
Fq=1.25
HA & HB
Fq=1.1
Fq=1.1
Temperature effects
1.3
1.3
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Combination-A: Considers the maximum values of all loads and

therefore normally generates the maximum reinforcement tension
and
d foundation
f
d ti
b i
bearing
pressure. It may also
l
d t
determine
i
th
the
reinforcement requirement to satisfy pull-out resistance although it
is
usually
governed
by
combination-B.

Combination B: Causes maximum overturning loads together

Combination-B:
with minimum self mass of the structure and superimposed traffic
loads.
Dictates the reinforcement requirement for pull-out
resistance
i t
and
d
sliding
lidi
along
l
th
the
b
base.

Combination-C: Dead loads only without partial load factors.

Used for foundation settlement calculations and for generating
reinforcement tensions for checking the serviceability limit state.
state
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What is the height of the wall

wall, H to consider
for design purposes ?

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Recap
This
Thislecturehasdescribedthedifferentdesign
lecture has described the different design
standardsforthereinforcedsoilretaining
walls and some design issues
wallsandsomedesignissues
Discussedtheexternalstabilitycalculationsfor
these walls
thesewalls

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