MONITORING AND NUMERICAL MODELING OF THE FULL SCALE EXPERIMENTAL EMBANKMENT ON SOFT DOUALA CLAYS OF CAMEROON

An experimental embankment for access to the bridge was constructed to obtain data on the compressibility of the soils encountered as well as on the rate of consolidation, which were less characterized. These data on the behavior of alluvial soils under the load of the embankment (amplitude and rate of settlement) allow to deduce their characteristics at large-scale compressibility. The test embankment was implemented on a 60 m length for a height of 8 m; of which 4.15 m overload compared to the final level of the project. The load provided by the embankment was estimated at 142 kPa. This embankment was instrumented by the settlement gauges, and the evolution of its behavior followed during the work phase. A Finite Element numerical modeling of the embankment was also carried out in order to predict its behavior. The comparison of experimental and numerical results was carried out. From this study, there is a good agreement between the results of the numerical modeling and the results of experimentation in real size on the site. The results obtained are a good example of the effectiveness of the methods employed; A final settlement of 1.75m (experimentally) against 1.99m (numerical modeling) was obtained.