Stepped Isothermal Methods Using Time-Temperature Superposition Principles for Lifetime Prediction of Polyester Geogrids

The failure of geogrids used for soil reinforcement application can be defined as an excessive creep strain which causes the collapse of slopes and embankments. Accordingly, the lifetime is evaluated as a time to reach the excessive creep strain using two accelerated creep testing methods, time-temperature superposition(TTS) and stepped isothermal methods(SIM). TTS is a well-accepted acceleration method to evaluate creep behavior of polymeric materials, while SIM was developed in the last ten years mainly to shorten testing time and minimize the uncertainty associated with inherent variability of multi-specimen tests. The SIM test is usually performed using single rib of geogrids for temperature steps of $14^{\circ}C$ and a dwell time of 10,000 seconds. However, for multi-ribs of geogrids, the applicability of the SIM has not been well established. In this study, the creep behaviors are evaluated using multi-ribs of polyester geogrids using SIM and TTS creep procedures and the newly designed test equipment. Then the lifetime of geogrids are predicted by analyzing the failure times to reach the excessive creep strains through reliability analysis.