LATERAL EARTH

PRESSURES
AND
RETAINING WALL
 LATERAL
EARTH
PRESSURES
1: LATERAL PRESSURE
IN WATER

2: LATERAL PRESSURE
IN SOIL
 Figure 1 shows the lateral
pressure diagram on a wall
of height H retaining water

The pressure at any point in a fluid such as water is the same in all
directions.
The lateral pressure on a vertical surface retaining water is equal to
where h = the height of water above the point considered

Total force P per unit length of wall will be equal to the area of the pressure
diagram

this force will act at the centroid of the diagram, i.e. at 2H/3 from the
surface
 In the case of soil, which. unlike water, possesses resistance to shearing, the
lateral pressure at any point will not be the same as the vertical pressure at that
point
In a homogeneous natural soil deposit, the ratio is a constant known as
coefficient of earth pressure at rest (K0).

For normally consolidated clays and granular soils,

In order to design soil-retaining structures

it is necessary to determine the magnitude of the lateral pressures to which the

structure is subjected.
The lateral pressure behind
a wall will vary depending
on whether the wall is going
away from soil or towards
soil.
 RETAINING WALL
Walls are generally used to provide
lateral support for:

• An earth fill
• Embarkment, or
• Some other material to support
vertical loads.
 WHAT ARE THE
TYPES OF WALL?
Retaining wall
What are the purposes,
functions and uses of
retaining wall ?
• Retaining walls are structures designed to restrain soil to
unnatural slopes.
• They are used to bound soils between two different elevations
often in areas of terrain possessing undesirable slopes or in
areas where the landscape needs to be shaped severely and
engineered for more specific purposes like hillside farming or
roadway overpasses.
• One main purpose for these walls is to maintain a difference
in elevation of the ground surface on each side of the wall.
• The basic function of these walls is to provide lateral support
for a mass of earth or other material that is at a higher
elevation behind the wall than the earth or other material in
front of the wall.
• Some reataining walls may support vertical loads in additon to
lateral loads from the retained materials.
GRAVITY WALLS

• The gravity wall depends mostly on its own weight for stability.
• It is usuallymade of plain concrete and is used for walls up to
approximately 10 ft in height.
• The semigravity wall is a modification of the grity wall in which
small amounts of reinforcing steel are introduced.
• This, in effect, reduces the massiveness of the wall.
CANTILEVER RETAINING WALL
CANTILEVER WALLS

• The cantilever wall (is the most

common type of retaining
structure and generally is used
for walls in the range from 10 to
25 ft in height).
• It is so named because its
individual parts (toe, heel, and
stem) behave as, and design as,
cantilever beams.
• Aside from its stability, the
capacity of the wall is a function
of the strength of its individual
parts.
COUNTERFORT WALLS

• The counter wall may be

economical when the wall
height is in excess of 25 feet.
• The counterforts are spaced at
intervals and act as tension
members to support the stem
• The stem is then designed as
a continuous member
spanning horizotally between
counterforts.
BATTRESS WALL

• The buttress wall is similar to

the counterfort wall except
that the buttress are located
on the side of the stem
opposite to the retained
material and act as
compression member to
support the stem
• The counterfort wall is more
commonly used because it
has a clean, uncluttered
exposed face and allows for
more efficient use of space in
front of the wall
 BASEMENT
FOUNDATION WALL

• The basement foundation wall

may act as cantilever retaining
wall
• The first floor may provide an
additional horizontal reaction
similar to the basement floor
slab, however, thereby making
the wall act as a vertical beam
• This wall would then be
designed as a simply
supported member spanning
between the first floor and the
basement floor slab
BRIDGE ABUTMENT

• The bridge abutment is similar

in some rspects to the
basement wall
• The bridge superstructure
induces horizontal as well as
vertical loads, thus altering the
normal cantilever behavior
BEARING WALLS

• The bearing wall may exists

with or without lateral loads
• A bearing wall may be define
as a wall that supports any
vertical load in addition to its
own weight
• Depending on the magnitudes
of the vertical and lateral
loads, the wall mat have to be
designed for combined
bending and axial
compression.
CONDITIONS OF
LATERAL EARTH
PRESSURE
Active Earth Pressure

Passive Earth pressure

At-Rest Pressure
Two principal stresses:
ACTIVE EARTH PRESSURE COEFFICIENT - - ratio between the lateral
and vertical principal effective stresses when an earth retaining structure
moves away (by a small amount from a retained soil.

PASSIVE EARTH PRESSURE COEFFICIENT - - ratio between the lateral

and vertical principal effective stresses when an earth retaining structure is
force against a soil mass.

EARTH PRESSURE AT REST – the ratio of the horizontal stress to the

vertical stress.
If the retaining structure does not move either to the right or to the left of its
initial position the soil mass will be in a state of elastic equilibrium. --- the
horizontal strain is zero p-
 TWO
CLASSICAL
THEORIES
 RANKINE AND
COULOMB THEORY
 RANKINE’S EARTH
PRESSURE THEORY
The implications of this expression are most
easily investigated by considering the
response of soil adjacent to a frictionless
retaining wall.

Then we can identify two limiting conditions:

1) Active failure

2) Passive failure
 Active failure
There is insufficient force to support the soil. Assuming that
the vertical stress is given simply by the weight of the
overlying soil and does not change during deformation,

the minimum horizontal stress may be determined from

v - 2 c N
 hmin =
N
 Passive failure
The force on the wall is greater than the resistance provided by
the soil. The horizontal stress reaches a maximum value given
by
ACTIVE EARTH PRESSURE COEFFICIENT - - ratio between the lateral and
vertical principal effective stresses when an earth retaining structure
moves away (by a small amount from a retained soil.
PASSIVE EARTH PRESSURE COEFFICIENT -
ratio between the lateral and vertical principal
effective stresses when an earth retaining
structure is force against a soil mass.