Modeling of pressuremeter tests to characterize the sands

Abstract

This paper proposes a numerical methodology for capturing the complete curve of a pressuremeter test including initial or disturbed parts and loops through a stiffness-based approach adopted in three dimensional finite difference code, FLAC3D. In order to enable this, a new hyperbolic model was used to replace the conventional linear elastic model prior to peak strength of Mohr-Coulomb soil model and update or degradation of shear modulus was considered. Presented modeling approach and implemented constitutive model are impressively successful. It leads to obtain the whole set of parameters for characterizing sands and seems promising for modeling the most of geotechnical structures.