Constitutive Model of Lateral Unloading Creep of Soft Soil under Excess Pore Water Pressure

摘要

Presented in this paper is a study on the lateral unloading creep tests under different excess pore water pressures. The marine sedimentary soft soil in Shenzhen, China, was selected in this study. The results show that the excess pore water pressure plays a significant role in enhancing the unloading creep of soft soil. Higher excess pore water pressure brings more obvious creep deformation of soft soil and lower ultimate failure load. Meanwhile, the viscoelastic and the viscoplastic modulus of soft soil were found to exponentially decline with creep time. A modified merchant model and a combined model of the modified merchant model and plastic elements are used to simulate the viscoelastic and the viscoplastic deformation, respectively. Therefore, a lateral unloading creep model of soft soil is developed based on the modified merchant model. The accuracy and applicability of this model were verified through identifying the parameters in the model. Research results are of particular significance to the numerical simulation of underground space excavation in soft soil areas which considers the effects of excess pore water pressure.