Influential factors in evaluating the construction pore pressure in earth dams by using UDAM program

摘要

The aim of this article is to discuss about the influential parameters affecting the state of the pore pressure within the low permeability section of an earth dam body during the periods of construction, immediately after construction, and also during some times elapsing after construction. Because the condition of soil in constructing earth dams is usually unsaturated, so the matter of unsaturated soils should be considered here and a special finite element program suitable to this topic needs to be applied. The finite element program used in this study is the UDAM finite element program which has been compiled specifically for illustrating the behavior of unsaturated soils. The results of the UDAM computations are discussed in view of the pore water pressure developed within the body of dam slope during the stages of construction, and its maximum positive values immediately after the construction and its variations in the post-construction times are shown. Because the positive pore pressure decreases the shear strength of soil and the negative pressure (i.e. suction) increases the strength, the state of slope stability is correlated with the influential factors which can affect the situation of pore pressure distribution within a given section. Therefore, based on the present computations, the effect of height of embankment, initial degree of saturation, coefficient of permeability, degree of compaction and finally the effect of elapsing time are illustrated.