Dynamic Characterization of Sands Used as Backfill in a Reinforced Earth Wall

The paper presents the results of the laboratory tests carried out to characterize two kinds of soils used for backfill of a reinforced earth wall that was built as a prototype in Brazil. To define the mechanical behavior of such backfill a series of static and dynamic laboratory tests were performed on dry reconstituted specimens. The static tests include direct shear tests performed on specimens reconstituted by the pluvial deposition method with different relative densities Dr. For the dynamic characterization, resonant column tests were performed to evaluate the equivalent shear modulus G and damping ratio D. The soil non linearity due to the decreasing of shear modulus and the increasing of damping ratio with shear strain was also evaluated.