A constitutive model for frozen granular soils

Abstract

In this contribution, an elastic-viscoplastic constitutive model of the Maxwell-Type to describe the time-dependent behavior of frozen soils is proposed based on results of unconfined and triaxial creep tests and strain rate-controlled compression tests from Orth (1985). The model is able to capture essential features of the behavior of frozen soils, as temperature-, rate- and mean-pressure-dependence for quasi-monotonic loading realistically, including the creep-failure-type observed in frozen soils under constant deviator stresses. The model has been validated by means of experimental data of a frozen sand and used to predict creep and rate-dependent behavior of frozen soils for monotonic loading.