On Empirical Correlations for Normalised Shear Strengths from Fall Cone and Direct Simple Shear Tests in Soft Swedish Clays

Abstract

Empirical correlations provide valuable information in early design stages, and they help to validate or discard single values from site investigations. This paper presents a multivariate database from commercial projects consisting of evaluated shear strengths obtained from direct simple shear tests and fall cone tests (which are calibrated to the field vane test), including index tests. The multivariate database is used to investigate the performance of common transformation models and to test the recommended correction for fall cone tests. It is found that the measured normalised shear strength evaluated from direct simple shear tests and fall cone tests is correlated to the liquid limit and that the results conform to Swedish and Norwegian recommendations. However, the scatter is large, more for fall cone tests than for direct simple shear tests, which is thought to depend mainly on sample disturbance. It can however be concluded that the trend of normalised shear strengths increases with increasing plasticity.