Experimental Study on the Effect of freeze-thaw cycle on Silty Clay Stress-Strain Behaviour

Abstract

The area of seasonally frozen soil in China accounts for about 54% of the national territorial area. The property of seasonally frozen soil has a great influence on highway, railway and architectural foundation. The effect of freeze-thaw cycle for saturated silty clay in Northeast Area on stress-strain behaviour was investigated by triaxial test in this paper, where three different freezing temperature and five different freeze-thaw cycle times were considered. The results showed that silty clay exhibited strain softening characteristics for small number of freeze-thaw cycles, while strain hardening characteristics will appear with the increase in freeze-thaw cycles. The deviatoric stress-axial strain relationship shows the transitional form from strain softening to strain hardening. It will be helpful to understand the strain behaviour of soil under freeze-thaw cycle.