SHEAR STRENGTH OF SOIL The shear strength of soil may be attributed to three basic components: 1.

Frictional resistance to sliding between solid particles 2. Cohesion and adhesion between particles 3. Interlocking and bridging of solid particles to resist deformation MOHR - COULOMB FAILURE CRITERIA A material fails because of a critical combination of normal stress and shearing stress, and not from either maximum normal or shear stress alone. This Theory was presented by Mohr. Thus, a failure plane can be expressed as a function of normal and shearing stress as follows: Tf =f() For most soil mechanics problem, coulomb suggested that the shear stress on the failure plane can be expressed as a linear function of normal stress. This relationship is known as Mohr -Coulomb failure criteria and can be written as: Tf = c + tan where: c= cohesion = angle of internal friction the significance of the failure envelope is as follows. If the normal and shearing stress on a plane in a soil mass are such that they plot as point X, shear failure will not occur along that plane. If it plots at Y, shear failure will occur along that plane because it plots along that plane. Point Z cannot exist because it plots above the failure envelope and shear failure would have occurred already.

TRIAXIAL SHEAR TEST (SINGLE TEST) Cohesive Soil Cohesionless Soil

DRAINED AND UNDERDRAINED TRIAXIAL TEST

For drained triaxial test '1 and '3 are taken as the effective principal stresses. For underdrained triaxial test , 1 and 3 are taken as the total principal stresses.

TRIAXIAL TEST (SERIES)

UNCONFINED COMPRESSION TEST (UNIAXIAL)

Direct Shear Test is the simplest for of shear test. The test equipment consists of a metal shear box in which the soil sample is placed. The sized of the sample used are usually 50 mm x 50 mm or 100 mm x 100 mm across and about 25 mm high. The box is split horizontally into halves. A normal forced is applied from the top of the shear box. Shear forced is applied by moving half of the box relative to the other to cause failure in the soil sample. NORMAL STRESS: = normal force/ cross sectional area of specimen SHEAR STRESS: T = resisting shear force/ cross sectional area of specimen

Direct Shear Test