Abstract
The use of geotextile as reinforced materials in Soil structures has become widespread throughout the world. Geotextile reinforcement has been used in retaining walls, slope of embankment and especially soft foundation, etc. In the past, however, its design and construction have been performed empirically. In this study, to investigate of the effect of geotextiles reinforced slope of the embankment on a very soft foundation, a limit equilibrium analysis program calculating the safety factor of embankment on very soft foundation was developed. The study was focussed on such factors as type of geotextile, tensile strength, amount of reinforcement, and inclination of embankment. And the 4imit equilibrium analysis program was written on the basis of Low's slope stability theory with some modification. The following conclusions were drawn from this study. (1) The orientation of reinforcement can be assumed either horizontal or tangential to the slip circle. The factor of safety with tangential reinforcement is larger than that with the horizontal reinforcement. (2) In general, the factor of safety increases, as the slope reduces. However, it is preferable to use geotextiles with higher tensile strength rather than to reduce the slope of the embankment, because it is difficult to adjust the slope as desired. (3) The factor of safety obtained by numerical computation is affected only by the tensile strength, but not by the type of the geotextile.