Seismic Earth Pressure Exerted on Retaining Walls Under a Large Seismic Load

Abstract

In recent years, serious damage has been done to retaining structures because of large earthquakes. In order to establish practical methods for evaluating the seismic earth pressure, which is one of the important external forces acting on retaining structures during large earthquakes, a series of shaking table tests was conducted on retaining wall (RW) models. The experiments revealed that the seismic active earth pressure was considerably smaller than that obtained by the Mononobe-Okabe theory, particularly under a large seismic load. Furthermore, it was demonstrated that the seismic earth pressure had an upper limit, which was determined by the force equilibrium of the soil wedge at the critical state when the RW lost its stability. On the basis of the test results, a new method to evaluate the seismic earth pressure for practical designs under a large seismic load has been suggested. This proposed method provides a reasonable earth pressure as well as an angle of failure plane, those of which depend on the seismic stability of the retaining wall. It has been conˆrmed that earth pressure obtained by the proposed method agrees well with the measured seismic earth pressure exerted on several retaining walls with diŠerent degrees of stability.

Active static and seismic earth pressure for c–φ soils

“…As pointed out by Sitar et al (2012), "the costs of an overconservative design can be just as much of a problem as the cost of a future failure". Other factors, including the generation of negative pore air pressure in backfills during earthquakes (Koseki et al, 2010) and the outward movement of a retaining wall under large seismic loads (Watanabe et al, 2011), may also reduce the seismic active earth pressure.…”

Dynamischer Erddruck auf starre und flexible Wände mittels Wellenlösungen: Numerische Einzelvergleiche für homogene und geschichtete Bodenprofile

“…Eine ausführliche Darstellung der Verfahren findet sich bei Vrettos et al . Experimentelle Untersuchungen sind wegen des erheblichen Aufwands moderner Versuchstechnik und der Schwierigkeiten bei der Realisierung der geometrischen Abstrahlungsdämpfung eher selten anzutreffen.…”

<b>Seismic Design of Retaining Wall Considering the Dynamic Response Characteristic</b>

“…There was no subsoil model in front of the base footing in order to simplify the model. Watanabe et al[3] have summarized the details of the model preparation.…”