CJCC

CONCEPT AND K0 DURING

SECONDARY COMPRESSION

By G. Mesri, 1 M. ASCE, and A. Castro 2

ABSTRACT: The CJCC concept, which completely defines secondary compression behavior of any one soil in terms of a constant Ca/Cc and the EOP e-Iog
cr, is a powerful practical tool for settlement analysis and interpretation of data
from load-controlled and deformation-controlled consolidation tests. The correct procedure for evaluating CJCC for any soil is described. The CJCC concept
was used to obtain an expression for the behavior of the coefficient of earth
pressure at rest, K, during secondary compression. This approach predicts an
increase in K during secondary compression. This approach also predicts that
the K = 1 condition will not be reached during the typical geologic age of soft
clay deposits. Laboratory measurements on the behavior of K0, including during secondary compression, are presented for four soft clays. The proposed
approach also provides an estimate of in situ K in soft clay deposits. Two alternative laboratory procedures were used to determine in situ K0 for four soft
clays. These values compare well with the predictions.
INTRODUCTION

The Ca/Cc concept was developed by Mesri and Godlewski (24) for
the analysis of secondary settlement. The concept is based on the observation that the magnitude and behavior of C with time is directly
related to the magnitude and behavior of Cc with consolidation pressure.
In general, C remains constant, decreases, or increases with time, in
the range of consolidation pressure at which Cc remains constant, decreases, or increases with a'v, respectively. The value of Ca/Cc together
with the end-of-primary (EOP) e-log v'v curve completely defines the secondary compression behavior of any one soil.
Since the publication of Mesri and Godlewski (24), additional data on
a wide range of geotechnical materials have been evaluated (21). For a
variety of natural materials, including peats, organic silts, highly sensitive clays, shales, as well as granular materials, the values of Ca/Cc are
in the remarkably narrow range of 0.02-0.10. For a majority of inorganic
soft clays:
C
= 0.04 0.01

(1)

and for the highly organic plastic clays:

C
= 0.05 0.01

(2)

'Prof., Dept. of Civ. Engrg., Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana,

IL 61801.
2
Research Asst., Dept. of Civ. Engrg., Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,
Urbana, IL 61801.
Note.Discussion open until August 1, 1987. To extend the closing date o n e
month, a written request m u s t be filed with the ASCE Manager of Journals. The
manuscript for this paper w a s submitted for review a n d possible publication on
March 24, 1986. This paper is part of the Journal of Geotechnical
Engineering,
Vol. 113, N o . 3, March, 1987. ASCE, ISSN 0733-9410/87/0003-0230/$01.00. Paper No. 21323.

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