Civil Engineering Association

Seismic earth pressures on retaining structures in cohesionless soils

[Image: 29715998312685232167.jpg]

Author(s): Mikola, Roozbeh Geraili; Sitar, Nicholas
Published By: University of California
Published Year: 2013
Size: 4,2 MB
Quality: Unspecified
Abstract: Observations of the performance of basement walls and retaining structures in recent
earthquakes show that failures of basement or deep excavation walls in earthquakes are rare even
if the structures were not designed for the actual intensity of the earthquake loading. Failures of
retaining structures are most commonly confined to waterfront structures retaining saturated
backfill with liquefaction being the critical factor in the failures. Failures of other types of
retaining structures are relatively rare and usually involve a more complex set of conditions, such
as sloping ground either above or below the retaining structure, or both. While some failures
have been observed, there is no evidence of a systemic problem with traditional static retaining
wall design even under quite severe loading conditions. No significant damage or failures of
retaining structures occurred in the recent earthquakes such as Wenchuan earthquake in China
(2008) and, or the large subduction zone earthquakes in Chile (2010) and Japan (2011).
Therefore, this experimental and analytical study was undertaken to develop a better
understanding of the distribution and magnitude of seismic earth pressures on cantilever
retaining structures.
The experimental component of the study consists of two sets of dynamic centrifuge
model experiments. In the first experiment two model structures representing basement type
setting were used, while in the second test a U-shaped channel with cantilever sides and a simple
cantilever wall were studied. All of these structures were chosen to be representative of typical
designs. Dry medium-dense sand with relative density on the order of from 75% to 80% was
used as backfill. Results obtained from the centrifuge experiments were subsequently used to
develop and calibrate a two-dimensional, nonlinear, finite difference model built on the FLAC
platform.

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