Model Tests on the Red Clay Foundation Reinforced by the Coir-Geotextile: Fid-Bau Portal

Model Tests on the Red Clay Foundation Reinforced by the Coir-Geotextile

Li, Liangyong / Zhang, Qingsong / Cao, Weiqiang / Xie, Peng / Cui, Jie / Zhang, Wan / Cheng, Yanwen

Coir-geotextile plays a significant role in the reinforcement of red clay foundation. The present study was envisaged to investigate the effect of the length, reinforced depth, and embedment depth of the first layer of coir-geotextile as well as the vertical spacing of coir-geotextile on the bearing capacity and distribution of Earth pressure along the depth of a red clay foundation using plate loading tests and numerical simulation. The results revealed that the bearing capacity of the red clay foundation increased with an increase in the length of coir-geotextile and the reinforced depth of coir-geotextile. The bearing capacity of the red clay foundation was inversely proportional to the embedment depth of the first layer of coir-geotextile and the vertical spacing of the coir-geotextile. The optimal length, reinforced depth, and embedment depth of the first layer of coir-geotextile were found to be $3 B$ , $2 B$ , and $0.25 B$ , respectively ( $B$ is the width of strip footing). The optimal vertical spacing of the coir-geotextile was found to be $0.25 B$ . The Earth pressure in the red clay foundation reinforced with the coir-geotextile showed a gradual reduction along the depth of foundation. However, it dropped slowly within the reinforced depth of coir-geotextile due to the stress concentration caused by the coir-geotextile and dropped faster outside the reinforced depth of coir-geotextile. The red clay foundation reinforced with the coir-geotextile failed by punching. Based on the punching failure, the calculated values of the bearing capacity ratio of the simplified calculation method were observed to be close to the measured values in the model tests. The results obtained by the small-scale model tests in the present study can provide a reference for the bearing capacity and Earth pressure distribution of the red clay foundation reinforced by coir-geotextile under similar test conditions.