Geotechnical Engineering-1

Course Code –CE-221

Credit Hours -3+1

Contact Hours -3+3

Dr Hassan Mujtaba

1
 General Introduction
• When load is applied, stress and strains are produced
in the material.
• In elastic material such as steel, the stress and strains
are produced simultaneously without any time lag.
Stress strain relation is time dependent in case of non-
elastic materials. i.e on application of load, stresses
are produced but signs of deformation become visible
only after some time.
• The materials in which stress strain relationship is
time dependent are called visco-elastic material and
soil fall in this category. 2
 General Introduction
• When soils are subjected to load, they deform and
when the load is released some permanent
deformation remain recorded in their memory. Thus,
soils have a system of memory which registers the
foot prints of each and every loading in the form of
its geological history.

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 Compression of Soil
• When a soil mass is subjected to a compressive force,
its volume decreases. The property of the soil due to
which a decrease in volume occurs under
compressive forces is known as the compressibility of
soil.
• The compression of soils (reduction in volume) can
occur due to one or more of the following causes.
– Compression of soil particles
– Compression of water and air in soil voids
– Escape/expulsion of water and air from the voids
• Compression of solid particles is negligibly small. 4
 Compression of Soil
• Compression of water in the voids is also extremely
small, as the water is almost incompressible in the
range of stresses involved in soil engineering.
• Air exists only in partially saturated soils and dry
soils. Air is highly compressible and is expelled
quickly as soon as the load is applied. Therefore, it
produces considerable amount of compression in soil
mass. However, it is not relevant for saturated soils.
• When the soil is fully saturated, compression of soil
occurs mainly due to expulsion of water from the
voids. 5
 Compression of Cohesionless Soil
• Cohesionless soils such as sand and gravels will
generally compress during relatively short time.
Furthermore, compression of such soils induced by
vibration effects could be obtained with much ease as
compared to cohesive soils. Infact, most of the
anticipated settlement of a foundation resting on
cohesionless soil has taken place during the
construction phase of the structure.

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 Compression of Cohesive Soil
• Unlike cohesionless soils, a saturated cohesive soils
with low permeability will compress quite slowly
since the expulsion of pore water from such soils take
place at a significantly slower rate than that of
cohesionless soils.
• Thus, for a cohesive material the total compression of
a saturated clay stratum require longer period than
that of cohesionless soil.

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 Consolidation of Soil
• The compression of a saturated soil under a steady
static pressure is known as consolidation.
• Consolidation can be defined as rate of volume
decrease with time.
• It is entirely due to expulsion of water from the voids.
• It is similar to the action of squeezing of water from a
saturated sponge under pressure. The soil behaves as
a saturated sponge. As the consolidation of soils
occurs, the water escapes. The solid particles shift
from one position to the other by rolling and sliding
and thus attain a closer packing. 8
 Consolidation of Soil
• It is worth noting that the decrease in volume of soil
occurs not due to compression of solids or water but
due to the shifting of positions of the particles as the
water escapes.
• Small volume changes may occur due to bending,
distortion and fracture of the solid particles, but such
changes are insignificant in the ordinary range of
stresses involved in soil engineering problems.

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 Settlement
• Settlement of a structure is its vertical, downward
movement due to a volume decrease of the soil on
which it is built. In other words, the settlement is the
gradual sinking of a structure due to compression of
the soil below. A study of consolidation
characteristics is extremely useful for forecasting the
magnitude and time of the settlement of the structure.
Se- Immediate/ Elastic Settlement
S  Se  Sc  Ss Sc- Primary Consolidation Settlement

Ss- Secondary consolidation Settlement

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 Settlement
Soil Settlement caused by load is divided into following
categories
• Immediate/ Elastic Settlement- which is caused by
elastic deformation of dry soil and of moist and
saturated soil without any change in moisture content.
• Primary consolidation settlement- which is the result
of a volume change in saturated cohesive soils
because of expulsion of water that occupies the void
space

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 Settlement
• Secondary consolidation settlement/ creep- which is
observed in saturated cohesive soils due to plastic
deformation of soil fabric as a result of some colloid-
chemical processes whose role in this regard are
mostly hypothetical at this point.
• Out of Primary and secondary consolidation, the
primary consolidation is much larger, easier to
predict, occurs at a faster rate and is important of the
two. However, for highly organic soil secondary
consolidation is very important. Normally, secondary
consolidation start after the completion of primary
consolidation. 12
 Three
Stages of
Compressi
on

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Difference between Compaction and Consolidation

• Density is increased by the reduction of volume

of air alone. Increase in water content may help
compaction where as in consolidation density is
increased by reduction of volume of voids caused
due to expulsion of water. It is a drainage process.
• Compaction is generally accomplished by rolling,
tamping or vibration where as consolidation is
caused by static loading.
• It is short time, time independent process where
as consolidation is long time, time dependent
process.
Difference between Compaction and Consolidation

• Compaction is applicable for both fine grained

and coarse grained soils whereas consolidation
is generally for fine-grained soil as coarse
grained soils should drain quickly under the
application of load due to high permeability.
• In compaction, application of compactive
effort is must where as consolidation is a
drainage process, it may be done by
evaporation alone without application of load.
 Consolidation Settlement
• When a saturated compressible layer is subjected to
stress increase, elastic settlement takes place
immediately. However, due to low hydraulic
conductivity of clay, the excess pore pressure
generated by loading dissipates gradually over long
period. Thus the associated volume change may
continue long after immediate settlement.
• The settlement caused by consolidation is several
times more than immediate settlement.

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 Consolidation Settlement
• The time dependent deformation of saturated clay can
be understood by considering a simple model that
consists of a cylinder with a spring at the center. The
inside cross section area of cylinder is A. The
cylinder is filled with water and has frictionless
watertight piston and valves as shown in Fig. If we
place a load on the piston and keep the valve closed,
the entire load is taken by the water. The spring will
not go through any deformation.
• The excess hydrostatic pressure at this time is given
by u 
P
A 17
Spring
Cylind
er
Model

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 Consolidation Settlement
• This value can be observed on the pressure gauge
attached to the cylinder. In general we can write
P  Ps  Pw
– Ps- load carried by spring
– Pw- load carried by water
• We can infer from this discussion that when the value
is closed after placing the load, Ps=0 and Pw=P.
• Now if the valve is opened, water will flow outward.
This flow is accompanied by reduction in excess
hydrostatic pressure and increase in the compression
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of spring
 Consolidation Settlement
• So, at this time, Ps > 0 and Pw < P.
• After some time, the excess hydrostatic pressure will
become zero and the system will reach a state of
equilibrium. Ps=P and Pw=0
• With this in mind, we can analyze the strain of a
saturated clay layer subjected to a stress increase.
• Consider a case where a layer of saturated clay of
thickness H is confined between two layers of sand
and is subjected to an instantaneous increase of total
stress, σ.
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 Consolidation Settlement
• The incremental total stress will be transmitted to
pore water and soil solids. This means total stress will
be divided between effective stress and pore water
pressure. The behaviour of effective stress change
will be similar to that of spring and that of pore water
pressure change will be similar to excess hydrostatic
pressure.
Total stress is written as
– σ = σ’+ u
– σ’- increase in effective stress
– u- increase in pore water pressure 21
Consolidation Settlement

22
Consolidation Settlement

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 Consolidation Settlement
• Since clay has very low hydraulic conductivity and
water is incompressible as compared with the soil
skeleton, at time t=0, the entire incremental stress, σ
will be carried by water (σ= u). None will be
carried by the soil skeleton i.e incremental effective
stress (σ’=0).
• After the application of incremental stress to clay
layer, the water in the void spaces will start to be
squeezed out and will drain in both directions into
sand layers. By this process, the excess pore pressure
in the clay layer will gradually decrease and the stress
carried by soil skeleton will increase. 24
 Consolidation Settlement
• At time, 0 < t < 
σ= σ’+ u (σ > 0 and u < σ)
• However, magnitude of σ’ and u at various depth
will change depending on the minimum distance of
the drainage path to either the top or bottom sand
layer.
• Theoretically at t=  , the excess pore water pressure
would be dissipated by drainage from all the points of
the clay layer; thus u=0. Now, total stress will be
carried by soil skeleton. (σ= σ’).
• This gradual transfer of stress causes time dependent
settlement in clay layer. 25