• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.45-55
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• 2015

The stability of the adjcent structures or slopes under blasting is typically evaluated using an empirical vibration attenuation curve or dynamic numerical analysis. To perform a dynamic analysis, it is necessary to determine the blast load and the damping ratio of rock mass. Various empirical methods have been proposed for the blast load. However, a study on representative values of damping ratio of a rock mass has not yet been performed. Therefore, the damping ratio was either ignored or selected without a clear basis in performing a blast analysis. Selection of the dampring ratio for the rock mass is very difficult because the vibration propagation is influenced by the layout and properties of the rock joints. Besides, the vibration induced by blasting is propagated spherically, whereas plane waves are generated by an earthquake. Since the geometrical spreading causes additional attenuation, the damping ratio should be adjusted in the case of a 2D plane strain analysis. In this study, we proposed equivalent damping ratios for use in continuum 2D plane strain analyses. To this end, we performed 2D dynamic analyses for a wide range of rock stiffness and investigated the characteristics of blast vibration propagation. Based on numerical simulations, a correlation between the attenuation equation, shear wave velocity, and equivalent damping ratio of rock mass is presented. This novel approach is the first attempt to select the damping ratio from an attenuation relationship. The proposed chart is easy to be used and can be applied in practice.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.28 no.9
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• pp.23-30
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• 2012

This paper is research results of slope stability analysis associated with seepage infiltration for unsaturated soil in debris-flow occurrence slopes. Site investigations were carried out in two slopes, located at Inje in Kangwon province where debris flow occurred in 2006 and at Yangpyung in Kyeunggi province where it occurred in 2010. For unsaturated soil sampled at the zone of debris-flow initiation, soil water characteristic curves with tempe pressure cells and shear strength parameters with newly designed shear strength apparatus were obtained respectively. The commertially available software SEEP/W was used to analyze seepage infiltration in unsaturated soil, based on their properties obtained from test results and the actual rainfall data at the moment of debris flow occurrence, and slope stability analysis with the program of SLOPE/W, associated with results of seepage analysis, was performed to simulate slope failure. As results of this research, seepage infiltration to unsaturated soil due to intensive rainfall was found to cause increase of ground water table as well as degree of saturation. Through this research slope stability analysis for unsaturated soil, considering the actual rainfall characteristic, might be a reasonable method of investigating characteristics of debris flow behavior, in particular, the moment of debris flow occurrence.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.28 no.12
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• pp.5-15
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• 2012

In this study, a series of CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) numerical analyses were performed in order to evaluate the thermal performance of six full-scale closed-loop vertical ground heat exchangers constructed in a test bed located in Wonju. The circulation HDPE pipe, borehole and surrounding ground formation were modeled using FLUENT, a finite-volume method (FVM) program, for analyzing the heat transfer process of the system. Two user-defined functions (UDFs) accounting for the difference in the temperatures of the circulating inflow and outflow fluid and the variation of the surrounding ground temperature with depth were adopted in the FLUENT model. The relevant thermal properties of materials measured in laboratory were used in the numerical analyses to compare the thermal efficiency of various types of the heat exchangers installed in the test bed. The simulation results provide a verification for the in-situ thermal response test (TRT) data. The CFD numerical back-analysis with the ground thermal conductivity of 4 W/mK yielded better agreement with the in-situ thermal response tests than with the ground thermal conductivity of 3 W/mK.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.15-21
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• 2013

The analysis of long-term performance of pavement sections under wheel loads is normally conducted in two separated steps. First the resilient behavior of the pavement is calculated assuming the pavement is a layered or discrete elastic medium, and then the permanent deformation is evaluated based on empirical permanent displacement equations. Material properties required in both steps can be obtained from cyclic triaxial tests, in other words, resilient and permanent deformation tests. While this analytical approach is simple and convenient, it does not consider the modulus degradation caused by cyclic loads, and some types of reinforcements such as geosynthetic cannot be modeled in this type of analysis. A model for degraded secant modulus is proposed and suggested to be used for the analysis of permanent behavior of unpaved roadway sections. The parameter for suggested model can be obtained from cyclic triaxial tests, regular practice in pavement engineering. Examples to estimate the model parameters are presented based on both laboratory permanent deformation test and large-scale plate load test.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.5-14
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• 2013

Among the various thermal properties, thermal conductivity of soils is one of the most important parameters to design a horizontal ground heat exchanger for ground-coupled heat pump systems. It is well known that the thermal conductivity of soil is strongly influenced by its density and water content because of its particulate structure. This paper evaluates some of the well-known prediction models for the thermal conductivity of particulate media such as soils along with the experimental results. The semi-theoretical models for two-component materials were found inappropriate to estimate the thermal conductivity of dry soils. It comes out that the model developed by Cote and Konrad provides the best overall prediction for unsaturated sands available in the literature. Also, a parametric analysis is conducted to investigate the effect of thermal conductivity, water content and soil type on the horizontal ground heat exchanger design. The results show that a design pipe length for the horizontal ground heat exchanger can be reduced with an increase in soil thermal conductivity. The current research concludes that the dimension of the horizontal ground heat exchanger can be reduced to a certain extent by backfilling materials with a higher thermal conductivity of solid particles.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.33 no.9
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• pp.5-22
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• 2017

The procedure that combines the result of infiltration analysis into stability analysis based on the limit equilibrium method is widely used to evaluate the impact of rainfall infiltration on slope stability. Accurate prediction of rainfall infiltration is essential to the prediction of landslides caused by rainfall, requires to obtain accurate unsaturated hydraulic properties of the soil. Among the unsaturated hydraulic characteristics of the soil, the importance of the soil-water characteristic curve describing the retained water characteristics of the soil is relatively well known and the measurement by test method to obtain the SWCC is gradually increasing. However, it takes a lot of time and expenses to experimentally measure the unsaturated conductivity characteristics of the soil. Therefore, it is common practice to estimate the hydraulic conductivity function from the SWCC. Although it is widely known that the SWCC has a great influence on rainfall infiltration, studies on the effect of the hydraulic conductivity function estimated from the SWCC on rainfall infiltration are very limited. In this study, we explained how the estimation model of the hydraulic conductivity function affects rainfall infiltration and slope stability analysis. To this end, one-dimensional infiltration analysis and slope stability analysis were conducted by using the data on the SWCC of weathered granite soil widely distributed in Korea. The applicability of each estimation model is discussed through review of the analysis results.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.34 no.12
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• pp.29-42
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• 2018

Shale and mudstone in Daegu-Gyungbuk area have low strength and resistance to weathering compared to other rocks. Therefore, it is necessary to evaluate their strength depending on the degree of saturation and crack development. In this study, shales and mudstones were collected from several construction sites in Daegu-Gyungbuk area. Their basic material properties such as porosity, SEM, chemical component, and durability were tested. A porosity (absorptivity) of mudstone was 31% (25%), which was 6 (8) times higher than that of shale. Some mudstone was easily disintegrated with water and it consisted of highly-active clay mineral such as smectite type. These rocks were prepared by small cube specimens for unconfined compression test. An unconfined compressive strength of dry rock was compared with saturated one. Microwave oven was operated step by step to stimulate void water within a saturated rock, which resulted into high temperature and micro crack initiation within rocks. A strength of microwaved rocks was compared with operation time and crack initiation. As a result, the average unconfined compressive strength of dry and saturated shale was 62 and 33 MPa, respectively. The strength of mudstone for each condition was 11 and 4 MPa. When a rock became saturated, its strength decreased by 47% and 64% for shale and mudstone at average. In addition to saturation, a rock was in the microwave for 15 secs, its strength decreased into 49% for shale and 52% for mudstone. When a microwave oven operated up to 20 sec, a rock was crushed into several pieces and its temperature was approximately 200 degrees.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.37 no.4
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• pp.19-26
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• 2021

The high-level radioactive waste (HLW) produced from nuclear power plants is disposed in a rock-mass at a depth of hundreds meters below the ground level. Since HLW is very dangerous to human being, it must be disposed of safely by the engineered barrier system (EBS). The EBS consists of a disposal canister, backfill material, buffer material, and so on. When the components of EBS are installed, gaps inevitably exist not only between the rock-mass and buffer material but also between the canister and buffer material. The gap can reduce water-retarding capacity and heat release efficiency of the buffer material, so it is necessary to investigate properties of gap-filling materials and to analyze gap spacing effect. Furthermore, there has been few researches considering domestic disposal system compared to overseas researches. In this reason, this research derived the peak temperature of the bentonite buffer material considering domestic disposal system based on the numerical analysis. The gap between the canister and buffer material had a minor effect on the peak temperature of the bentonite buffer material, but there was 40% difference of the peak temperature of the bentonite buffer material because of the gap existence between the buffer material and rock mass.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.35 no.10
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• pp.33-45
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• 2019

In this study, in order to recycle a large amount of rocks and weathered mudstones produced by civil engineering projects such as railways and highways, as materials for roadbeds or embankment materials, circumferential specimens with a diameter of 5 cm and a height of 10 cm were made. A mudstone that weathered rapidly during rainfall was collected from Pohang construction sites. The weathered mudstone passed through a 2 mm sieve. It was prepared with the cement ratio, the sand ratio, curing condition and curing days. Three specimens were prepared according to each condition and then the unconfined compressive test, durability test and SEM analysis were performed to evaluate the engineering properties of the cemented soil. In the case of 28 days cured specimen, the strength of under-water cured specimens was 32-55% and the durability index was about 15% higher than air cured specimens. In addition, when the CR increased from 8% to 16%, the unconfined compressive strength (UCS) of pure mudstone cemented soil under water increased by about 1.6 times and the durability index increased by about 1.9 times. When the SR increased from 0% to 50%, the UCS of the specimen with SR = 10% was slightly less than or equal to specimen with SR = 0%. Then, as the SR became 30-50%, the UCS increased up to 51%. Unlike the UCS, the durability index increased continuously as the SR increased. As a result of SEM analysis, when SR was 50% rather than SR = 0%, the contact between sand particles increased and they were connected to each other. Such contact between these particles resulted in the increase of strength.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.12 no.7
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• pp.31-37
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• 2011

Only a few studies have been conducted using reduced slag as recycled material. The reduced slag in electric furnace is produced as a by-product in making a steel and a few applications of the reduced slag as expensive additives and bonding materials or as the stabilized soils was reported. The purpose of this study is to present the feasibility of the reduced slag as recycled material, especially, in a field of civil engineering. In order to achieve the purpose experiments such as SEM and XRF analysis was conducted for the reduced slag in electric furnace. Based on the results various geotechnical experiments were conducted to know engineering properties of slag-soil mixtures. Weathered soils and clay are mixed with reduced slag for various ratios. As the ratio of reduced slag to weathered soil increases, the maximum dry unit weight of the mixture decreased with increasing optimum moisture content. The results indicates that there is no effect on a reduced slag by compaction efforts. The shear strengths of the weathered soil-slag mixtures are slightly higher or similar to those of weathered soils. The permeability of the weathered soil-slag mixtures is similar to that of silty or sandy soils. Therefore, it is possible to use the mixtures as embankment or backfill materials in the fields. The unconfined strength of the mixtures of reduced slag and clay is higher than that of clay and it tends to increase with the curing time. Therefore it can be used to improve the soft ground.