Assessment of safety of slopes with likelihood for developing cracks is typically done considering a crack as a pre-existing condition. However, crack opening is part of the slope failure process that requires energy to overcome the resistance of the soil. This presentation will describe a method for implementation of the crack opening process in limit analysis. Three cases are distinguished: (a) assessment of safety for slopes with pre-existing cracks, (b) crack formation as part of the slope collapse process, and (c) collapse of slopes with existing water-filled cracks. The last case is expected to be the most adverse. This presentation, however, is focused on the first two cases. A simple example is presented first to indicate that there is a well-defined (and non-trivial) location of the opening crack that leads to the most critical configuration of the collapse mechanism. The kinematic approach of limit analysis is implemented for both translational and rotational mechanisms. Examples of numerical results are shown to identify trends in the limit analysis solutions.
展开▼
