Abstract
This thesis contains an experimental investigation of the yielding behaviour of sand loaded in triaxial compression, extension and a combination of both (stress reversal). The testing programme was conducted on 102 x 205 mm medium dense samples of fine Leighton Buzzard sand. A considerable part of the work was directed towards improving the testing technique in order to obtain good quality data. For this purpose, an automated stress path system was constructed and programmed utilizing a microcomputer to take full control of the applied stresses so that any desired stress path could be closely followed in the conventional triaxial cell. Furthermore, new displacement measuring devices were developed and used throughout the testing programme for monitoring both axial and radial deformation locally on the middle third of the triaxial specimen. The results indicate that generally the behaviour of sand is highly anisotropic and that during non-reversal stress paths, the yield condition can be described by a set of curved yield loci in the p'-q stress space. Such yield loci have more curvature in extension than in compression. Stress reversal is found to cause a significant softening of the stress-strain behaviour. However, depending on the level of deviatoric prestress on the opposite side, the sand may become even softer than in the virgin stress-strain condition. The typical errors likely to occur during conventional deformation measurement are discussed, and it is concluded that the use of local measurement should replace both external axial and volumetric monitoring techniques.