EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION ON SHEAR STRENGTH OF ARTIFICIALLY FROZEN C - PHI SOIL

Artificial Ground Freezing (AGF) is a construction technique which has been in practice for over a century, mainly in the cold regions of the world. AGF is considered as a ground improvement technique which can improve the site conditions for various civil engineering projects. It is typically used for ground stabilization and ground water control for wide variety of applications in all soil types. In-depth knowledge of the frozen soil characteristics through experiments and the development of suitable constitutive models that suit the geological conditions of our country are necessary to predict the strength and behaviour of the frozen soils. The strength and mechanical behaviour of this material can be determined experimentally and can be even predicted numerically. As this technology is not yet explored in our country an apparatus to test the strength of frozen soil in the triaxial condition is not yet developed in the laboratory. As part of this study a triaxial compression apparatus is designed and fabricated to test frozen soil samples incorporating the features of the existing triaxial apparatus on the basis of the reviewed literature and hence determining the shear parameters and strength of C-Phi soil. A more precise strength comparison between the frozen and unfrozen soil sample is done effectively in this investigation.