Stability Analysis of Slope Protection

for a Retaining Wall Structure at Lemah

Ireng-2 Bridge, Semarang – Solo Toll
Road, Indonesia

Edy Purwanto
Department of Civil Engineering, Islamic University of Indonesia,
Yogyakarta, 55584 Indonesia
e-mail: purwanto_edy57@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT
Lemah Ireng-2 Bridge, section VI, Semarang – Bawen toll road is a monumental structure of
PT. Trans Marga Jateng, Departement of Publics Work, Indonesia. The bridge has span of: 85
m – 130 m – 85 m and 25 m width, more than 35 m height above the land surface. The upper
structure of the bridge is box girder and the sub structure is bored piles foundation. The
Construction staging of Lemah Ireng Bridge is a balanced cantilever method. The abutment A2
structure is laid on the valey so to get the final grade of the highway surface needs a fills works
more than 8 m height at the back side of the abutment A2. To maintain this soils fill is needed a
Retaining wall structure where this structure stands also at the valey. To stabilize the abutment
A2 and the retaining wall along service time due to water rainfall, it is covered by earth fill on
the front and the right sides of the two structures by as a slope protection. The analysis of the
slope protection uses Plaxis version 8.50. The result of the study gets the Safety Factor ( SF) =
1,43. This value is bigger than SF = 1,30 approved at the proyect, so the slope protection is
stable.
KEYWORDS: analysis, slope stability, bridge, abutment, plaxis program
version 8.5

INTRODUCTION
Toll road construction is verry important activity to provide a good transportation public
and to solve the traffics in the national road from Semarang to Solo and the surrounding cities
in the Central Java province. Toll road Semarang – Solo is constructed in two phases.
Phase I is Semarang - Bawen section and the second phase is Bawen - Solo section. The
main road alignment passes at the villages, hills, forests and agricultural areas. Based on the
topography, the bridge should be built along from station 22+125 to station 22+840, that is
Lemah Ireng-2 bridge. The structure of the bridge consists of two piers (Piers P1 and P2) and
two abutments (Abutment A1 and A2). The Lemah Ireng-2 bridge has tree spans of 85 m – 130

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 Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7090

m – 85 m and 25 m witdh. The upper structure of the bridge is box girder and the sub structure is
bored piles foundation. The Construction staging of Lemah Ireng bridge is a balanced cantilever
method (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Structure of Lemah Ireng Bridge

Abutment A2 structure laids on the at valley, so to get a final grade of the toll road surface
needed an embankment soil more than 8 m height and 150 m length from the back of the
abutment A2 structure (Wing walls structure). To prevent the movement of the soil fill a
Retaining Wall should be constructed which paralelly with the wing wall. (PT. Global Perfex
Synergi & ASS. 2012).
The success of bridge construction on clay shale relies on proper planning, design,
construction control and site supervision. The construction methods employed at site also have
significant effect to ensure the successfully.
Based on the situation and the condition in the field, a new slope protection should be built
in this place to prevent the landslide and ensure this structure to give a guarantee construction
of bored piles foundation of the abutment A2.
This paper presents the result of the study of the slope protection stability at the retaining
wall structure abutment A2, Semarang – Solo toll road using the Plaxis version 8,50.
 Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7091

SLOPE STABILITY
The principles of slope stability have been developed over the past seventy years and
provide a set of soil mechanics principles from which to approach practical problems. Although
the mechanism of slope failure in heap leaching may be difficult to predict, the principles used in
a standard of practice examination are relatively straightforward. There are many forms of slope
failures. Slope stability analysis is an analytical tool for assessing the stability of a slope by
using a simple failure model in analysis. There are two methods to slope stability analyzis, the
first method is a limiting equilibrium method (LEM) and the second metod is a finit element
method (FEM).
The limit equilibrium method by assuming the failure happened at the points a long the
surface failure. The Shear strength is needed to maintain the limit equilibrium conditions
compare with the shear strength at the soil and will give the average safety factors a long the
failure line. According to Yanmei Yang et al (2015) the rainfall intensity and duration effect on
slope soil to layer the slope, giving different material parameters, using double strength
subtraction analysis to obtain the influence of rainfall intensity and duration on the stability of
the slope.
PLAXIS program is a finite element package that has been developed specifically for the
analysis of deformation and stability in geotechnical engineering projects. The simple graphical
input procedures enable a quick generation of complex finite element models, and the enhanced
output facilities provide a detailed presentation of computational results. The calculation itself is
fully automated and based on robust numerical procedures. It is equipped with features to deal
with various aspects of geotechnical structures and construction processes using robust and
theoretically sound computational procedures (Brinkgreve, R.B.J et al. (2007)).
In PLAXIS version 8,50, the geometry of the model can be easily defined in the soil and
structures modes, after which independent solid models can automatically be intersected and
meshed. The staged construction mode allows for simulation of construction and excavation
processes by activating and deactivating soil clusters and structural objects. The calculation
kernel enables a realistic simulation of the non linear, time dependent and anisotropic behaviour
of soils and/or rock. Since soil is a multi phase material, special procedures allows for
calculations dealing with hydrostatic and non hydrostatic pore pressures in the soil. The output
consists of a full suite of visualization tools to check the details of the 2D underground soil-
structure model (Brinkgreve, R.B.J et al. (2007))
Typical PLAXIS applications include: assessing street level displacements during the tunnel
construction, consolidation analysis of embankments, soil displacements around an excavation
pit, dam stability during different water levels, and much more.
PLAXIS version 8,50 is a user friendly geotechnical program offering flexible and
interoperable geometry, realistic simulation of construction stages, a robust and reliable
calculation kernel, and comprehensive and detailed post-processing, making it a complete
solution for your daily geotechnical design and analysis.
B.Manna et all (2014) shows the load settlement responses of soil- slopes obtained from
finite element analysis are compared with model test results and a very close agreement is found
for a specific value of cohesion considered in the numerical model. Factor of safety is also
determined using limit equilibrium method for the respective models.
 Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7092

Hamed Niroumand et al. (2012) advised to safeguard the safety of the public from slope
failure hazards, proper geotechnical input by the engineers with geotechnical experience is very
important. The geotechnical input includes four important stages namely, planning, design,
construction and maintenance. Whenever failures occur, engineers are responsible to the
problems.

RETAINING WALL STRUCTURE

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.
In the field, the abutment A2 structure laids on the valey, to get the final grade of the toll
road surface is needed a soil embankment works more than 8 m height and 150 m length from
the back side of the abutment A2. To prevent the horizontal movement of the soil embankments
is needed a Retaining wall structure placed at the left side and became continuous structure with
the abutment A2. Type of the retaining wall structure is a cantilevered wall made from the
concrete materials. Type of soils used is sandy clay where the soils is taken from the Sta. 0 +
225. To stabilize the abutment A2 along service time due to water rainfall, it is covered by earth
fill on the front and right of Abutment A2 by as a slope protection. The retaining wall structure
is presented in Figure 2.The stability of structure consists of the external stability and internal
stability.

Slope protection
under construction

Figure 2: Slope Protection of the Retaining Wall at Lemah Ireng-2 Bridge

 Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7093

GEOTECHNICAL DATA
The abutment A2 and the reataining wall structure stands up on the steep natural valley
where the soil is clay-shale. Clay-shale is a type of ground rock hard if not disturbed, but
otherwise the clay-shale when peeled, ground clay-shale contact with water and exposed to
sunlight, the soil properties of clay-shale will change. Physically clay-shale changes into mud
and soil strength decreased significantly. To take over this problem happened in the field and
give a guarrantee succesfully bored pile foundation construction needs geotechnical engineering.
The properties of the clayshale is presented in Table 1.

Table 1: Properties of the clay-shale

No. Clayshale w w GS Compressive Cohesion Friction Composition
natural saturated strenght (kg/cm2) angle Ca Na
(%) (%) (kg/cm2) ( o) (%) (%)
1. Tuffa 32,70 100 2,67 - 6,40 22 - -
2. Grey and
weathering 9,79 125,21 2,82 45,234 11,28 37,01 0,88 0,70
3. Dark and
fresh 11,69 61,96 2,91 73,754 17,83 38,40 3,94 0,74
Source: PT. Selimut Bumi Adhi Cipta, 2012

Soil investigation has realized specially at location and around Abutment A2 structure. The
objective is to get a information about soil layers, condition and caracteristics of subsoil, soil
type and water level. The Figure 3. shows a schematic profile of sub-soil and Table 2. presents
the result of laboratory tests of the soil properties.
Table 2: Soil Properties for Slope Protection
Soil Clayey Clay shale Clay shale
Parameter
Embankment silt I II
MC MC MC MC -
17,80 18,00 17,50 17,00 kN/m3
21,00 22,00 18,00 19,00 kN/m3
E 10235 10350 10062,5 9775 kN/m2
v 0,33 0,33 0,33 0,33 -
25 60 55 40 kN/m2
30 35 30 25
Source: PT. Global Perfex Synergi (2012)
Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7094

Figure 3: Bor Log in the Field

(Source: PT. Waskita Karya, 2011)
 Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7095

ANALYSIS OF THE SLOPE PROTECTION STABILITY

AND RESULTS OF THE STUDY
Results of the investigation in the field indicate that the slope failure beside of the retaining
wall structure was identified caused by infiltration of rain fall into to the soil and it cause
reduction of shear strength of soil. From observation in the field the rain-fall water gets out at
the plat-form of Abutment A2 structure area. Based on that conditions and the topography
existing was proposed a new slope protection built in three steps with 2,00 m berm width and the
slope is made 1 V: 1,50 H. To analizys the slope stability use Plaxis program version 8.50. The
soil embankment is worked and compacted layer by layer with 20 cm thickness with the
following a guide for soils compaction for soil fines agregates.
The topography model of the slope protection to analysis is presented in Figure 4.

12,50 Where:
I is soils fill
100kN/m II is clayey silt
2 Retaining wall
III is clay shale, black color
IV is clay shale, grey color
7.00 I V is sandy clay
Berm
8.00 I 1V: 1,5 H

10.00 III 1 V: 1,5 H Ber Slope protected by

m soil selected

I
V 1 V: 1,5 H
35.00

20,30 16,50
2,00 12,0 2,00 21,45
0
Figure 4: Topography Model of the Slope Protection

The results of the study are presented at Figure 5, 7 and 8.

Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7096

Figure 5: Total Displacement

Figure 6: Direction of the Soil displacements

Figure 8: Efektif Stress

Figure 7: Effective Stress

 Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7097

Figure 8: Safety factors

Figure 5 shows the total displacement. The maximum total displacement is 837,70 10-3 m. The
figure 6 and 7 shows the direction of the soil displacements and the effective stresses at the slope. The
effective stress value is - 993,20kN/m2. The figure 9 at bellow presents the safety factor curves. From
the Figure 9, we gets the safety factor (SF ) = 1,430 and this value is bigger than safety factor
recommended in filed, SF = 1,30. So the slope protection analyzed is stable. Beside that, to prevent
the surface erosion at Abutment A2 caused do rainfall, the slope protection is needed to protect and
make the stability of the Abutment A2 is more safe.
The geotechnical review is important for a civil engineering consultant and contractor to have
some fundamental geotechnical knowledge to prevent failure occurs. To protect the retaining wall
structure and prevent a degradation of sub structure of the Abutment A2 anew slope should be built in
three steps with 2,00 m berm width and the slope is made 1 V: 1,50 H is recommended. This new
slope structure can ultimately facilitate the work in the field

CONCLUSION
The results of the study gets the safety factors, SF = 1,43, this value is bigger than SF = 1,30
recommended in field, so the slope protection for the retaining wall structure at Abutment A2 is stable
and recommended. The stability of the Abutmen A2 is more safe with slope protection.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The authorswish to gratefully acknowledge the contribution and cooperation of PT Trans Marga
Jateng, Departement of Civil Works Indonesia, that has funded this study/research and the contruction
in the field.

REFERENCES
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Sons, Inc. New York.
Vol. 21 [2016], Bund. 23 7098

[2] B.Manna et al. (2014) Effect of Shurcharge Load on Stability of Slope – Testing and
Analysis, Electronic Journal of Geotechnical Engineering, Vol.19[2014], Bund.N
[3] Duncan, J.M., and Buchignani, A.L. (1975) An Engineering Manual for Stability Studies,
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Tanah (Retainning Wall) pada Abutment A2, Sta.22+125, Bawen. Semarang.
[14] PT. Global Perfex Synergi, (2012) Stabilitas Lereng Pekerjaan Galian dan Timbunan
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© 2016 ejge

Editor’s note.
This paper may be referred to, in other articles, as:
Edy Purwanto: “Stability Analysis of Slope Protection for a Retaining Wall
Structure at Lemah Ireng-2 Bridge, Semarang – Solo Toll Road, Indonesia”
Electronic Journal of Geotechnical Engineering, 2016 (21.22), pp 7089-
7098. Available at ejge.com.