UNIVERSIDAD NACIONAL DE COLOMBIA

FACULTAD DE INGENIERÍA
DEPARTAMENTO DE INGENIERÍA CIVIL Y AGRÍCOLA
INGENIERÍA CIVIL
SECCIÓN: GEOTECNIA

WORKSHOP: Effective Stress.

 The strata in the flat bottom of a valley consist of 3 m of coarse gravel overlaying
12m of clay. Beneath the clay is fissured sandstone of relatively high permeability.
The water table in the gravel is 0.6 m below ground level. The water in the sandstone
is under artesian pressure corresponding to a stand-pipe level of 6 m above ground
level.
The unit weight of the soil are:

Gravel above water table 16 kN/m3

below water table (Saturated) 20 kN/m3

Clay Saturated 22 kN/m3

1. Plot total stresses, pore water pressures and effective vertical stresses against
depth:
a) With initial ground water levels.
b) Assuming that the water level in the gravel is lowered 2m by pumping, but
the water pressure in the sandstone is unchanged.
c) Assuming that the water level in the gravel is kept as for (b), but that relief
wells lower the water pressure in the sandstone by 5.5 m.
d) Assuming that the relief wells are then pumped to reduce the water level in
the sandstone to 15 m below ground level.
Note that for (b), (c) and (d), stresses are required both for the short-term and the
long-term conditions.

2. To what depth can a wide excavation be made into the clay before the bottom blows
up (neglect side shear) assuming the initial ground water level.
a) With initial artesian pressure in sandstone?
b) With relief wells reducing the artesian pressure to 0.6 m above ground level?
 c) With relief wells pumped to reduce the pressure to 1.5 m below ground
level?

3. An excavation 9 m in depth (below ground level) is required. If a ratio of total vertical

stress to uplift pressure of 1.3 is required for safety, to what depth must the
piezometric head in the sandstone be lowered?

4. If the coefficient of volume change of the clay is 0.0002 m2/kN to what extent would
the clay layer in the locality eventually decrease in thickness if the artesian pressure
were permanently lowered by this amount?

5. If, on the other hand, the water level in the sandstone were raised to 15 m above
ground level owing to the impounding behind a dam upstream of the site, at what
depth in the undisturbed clay would the vertical effective stress be least and what
would this value be?