Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow Backfill
For a retaining wall adjacent to rock or rigid structures, existing model test results indicate that the slip soil in the limit state can be approximated as a trapezoidal slip wedge. Based on the static equilibrium condition of the slip wedge, a calculation method for active and passive earth pressu...
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MDPI AG
2025-02-01
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| author | Xu Wang Faning Dang Xiaoshan Cao Le Zhang Jun Gao Haibin Xue |
| author_facet | Xu Wang Faning Dang Xiaoshan Cao Le Zhang Jun Gao Haibin Xue |
| author_sort | Xu Wang |
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| description | For a retaining wall adjacent to rock or rigid structures, existing model test results indicate that the slip soil in the limit state can be approximated as a trapezoidal slip wedge. Based on the static equilibrium condition of the slip wedge, a calculation method for active and passive earth pressures is proposed that considers the effect of backfill width through extreme value analysis. As the backfill width increases, the trapezoidal slip wedge transitions to a triangular slip wedge, introducing a critical width to distinguish between finite and semi-infinite soil conditions. For cohesionless soils, the proposed method converges to Coulomb theory at the critical width; when the backfill is clay, the critical width exceeds the width of Coulomb’s triangular slip wedge due to the stabilizing contribution of cohesion. Parameter analysis reveals that with increasing backfill width, the active earth pressure of cohesionless soil follows a non-linear upward trend, whereas the passive earth pressure decays exponentially. For clay, the active earth pressure initially increases with backfill width and then decreases, whereas the passive earth pressure first decays exponentially and then exhibits a slight increase. Variations in the friction angle significantly affect both active and passive earth pressures, while cohesion mainly influences active earth pressure, and wall-soil friction angle exerts a stronger impact on passive earth pressure. The effectiveness of the proposed method is verified by comparison with results from model tests and numerical simulations. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-e032089ec4f04fc89aa1db94f4f51c77 |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2076-3417 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-02-01 |
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| spelling | doaj-art-e032089ec4f04fc89aa1db94f4f51c772025-08-20T03:11:03ZengMDPI AGApplied Sciences2076-34172025-02-01154175010.3390/app15041750Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow BackfillXu Wang0Faning Dang1Xiaoshan Cao2Le Zhang3Jun Gao4Haibin Xue5School of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Xi’an University of Technology, Xi’an 710048, ChinaSchool of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Xi’an University of Technology, Xi’an 710048, ChinaSchool of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Xi’an University of Technology, Xi’an 710048, ChinaSchool of Civil Engineering and Architecture, University of Jinan, Jinan 250024, ChinaSchool of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Xi’an University of Technology, Xi’an 710048, ChinaSchool of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Xi’an University of Technology, Xi’an 710048, ChinaFor a retaining wall adjacent to rock or rigid structures, existing model test results indicate that the slip soil in the limit state can be approximated as a trapezoidal slip wedge. Based on the static equilibrium condition of the slip wedge, a calculation method for active and passive earth pressures is proposed that considers the effect of backfill width through extreme value analysis. As the backfill width increases, the trapezoidal slip wedge transitions to a triangular slip wedge, introducing a critical width to distinguish between finite and semi-infinite soil conditions. For cohesionless soils, the proposed method converges to Coulomb theory at the critical width; when the backfill is clay, the critical width exceeds the width of Coulomb’s triangular slip wedge due to the stabilizing contribution of cohesion. Parameter analysis reveals that with increasing backfill width, the active earth pressure of cohesionless soil follows a non-linear upward trend, whereas the passive earth pressure decays exponentially. For clay, the active earth pressure initially increases with backfill width and then decreases, whereas the passive earth pressure first decays exponentially and then exhibits a slight increase. Variations in the friction angle significantly affect both active and passive earth pressures, while cohesion mainly influences active earth pressure, and wall-soil friction angle exerts a stronger impact on passive earth pressure. The effectiveness of the proposed method is verified by comparison with results from model tests and numerical simulations.https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/15/4/1750retaining wallearth pressurefinite soilcritical widthtrapezoidal slip wedge |
| spellingShingle | Xu Wang Faning Dang Xiaoshan Cao Le Zhang Jun Gao Haibin Xue Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow Backfill Applied Sciences retaining wall earth pressure finite soil critical width trapezoidal slip wedge |
| title | Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow Backfill |
| title_full | Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow Backfill |
| title_fullStr | Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow Backfill |
| title_full_unstemmed | Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow Backfill |
| title_short | Solution for Active and Passive Earth Pressure on Rigid Retaining Walls with Narrow Backfill |
| title_sort | solution for active and passive earth pressure on rigid retaining walls with narrow backfill |
| topic | retaining wall earth pressure finite soil critical width trapezoidal slip wedge |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2076-3417/15/4/1750 |
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