Modelling of shear strength paramaters of saturated clayey soils

Abstract

Shear strength of a soil can be defined as the maximum shear stress that can resist by the internal forces of the soil. Shear strength must be determined to solve the soil stability problems. The shear strength parameters of the soil are cohesion and internal friction angle. These parameters can be determined in the laboratory by the direct shear test, triaxial test and unconfined compression test. However, laboratory tests take time and engineers want to define these parameters easily by using software. The development of the computer technology presents abilities to model the soil behavior in civil engineering applications. In this study, triaxial compression tests are performed on saturated clayey soils under different confining pressures. Unconsolidated-Undrained test is chosen to identify short term behavior. After the experimental procedure, the test is modeled by using the Plaxis program and the results are compared. Relationship between the results are presented.