Location
San Diego, California
Presentation Date
27 May 2010, 4:30 pm - 6:20 pm
Abstract
Current practice (2009) for seismic analysis of embankment dams relies heavily on empirical correlations with penetration resistance (standard penetration test or cone penetration test) to predict the residual undrained shear strength of liquefied foundation materials. At least six such relationships have been published for the SPT alone, in different “formats.” Some apply a fines adjustment to the SPT blowcounts, but others do not; some express the predicted strength as a ratio with pre-earthquake effective overburden stress, whereas others predict it directly, without explicit consideration of overburden. For the foundations of embankment dams, the difference between the strength-ratio approach and prediction of Sur directly, from the SPT alone, can be important. In this paper, the underlying assumptions and data are reviewed critically, including the effects of different material types and different mechanisms governing the strength. Simplified statistical analyses were applied in attempt to determine the most appropriate format for a correlation and to obtain a new correlation that explicitly accounts for both overburden and blowcount.
Department(s)
Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
Meeting Name
5th International Conference on Recent Advances in Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering and Soil Dynamics
Publisher
Missouri University of Science and Technology
Document Version
Final Version
Rights
© 2010 Missouri University of Science and Technology, All rights reserved.
Creative Commons Licensing
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Document Type
Article - Conference proceedings
File Type
text
Language
English
Recommended Citation
Gillette, David Rees, "On the Use of Empirical Correlations for Estimating the Residual Undrained Shear Strength of Liquefied Soils in Dam Foundations" (2010). International Conferences on Recent Advances in Geotechnical Earthquake Engineering and Soil Dynamics. 26.
https://scholarsmine.mst.edu/icrageesd/05icrageesd/session04b/26
Included in
On the Use of Empirical Correlations for Estimating the Residual Undrained Shear Strength of Liquefied Soils in Dam Foundations
San Diego, California
Current practice (2009) for seismic analysis of embankment dams relies heavily on empirical correlations with penetration resistance (standard penetration test or cone penetration test) to predict the residual undrained shear strength of liquefied foundation materials. At least six such relationships have been published for the SPT alone, in different “formats.” Some apply a fines adjustment to the SPT blowcounts, but others do not; some express the predicted strength as a ratio with pre-earthquake effective overburden stress, whereas others predict it directly, without explicit consideration of overburden. For the foundations of embankment dams, the difference between the strength-ratio approach and prediction of Sur directly, from the SPT alone, can be important. In this paper, the underlying assumptions and data are reviewed critically, including the effects of different material types and different mechanisms governing the strength. Simplified statistical analyses were applied in attempt to determine the most appropriate format for a correlation and to obtain a new correlation that explicitly accounts for both overburden and blowcount.
