Reply to the discussion by Ling Xu on 'Weak tensile characteristicsof loess in China — An important reason for ground fissure' by PingSun, Jian-Bing Peng, Li-Wei Chen, Yue-Ping Yin and Shu-Ren Wu,[Engineering Geology 108 (2009) 153-159]

摘要

The authors would like to express their thanks and appreciation tothe discusser's interest in this paper and for the comments raised. Thediscusser's contribution stresses two main points: (a)the discusserthink that the information presented in this paper is not sufficient toobtain the conclusions on loess tensile strength, and it seems that sheis looking for more detailed discussion or description on the rangeof water content for loess samples in tensile strength test; (b)thediscusser deems that the loess still has the similar collapse character-istics with the increase in water content (decreasing suction), even inshearing. The following is a response to,the points raised by thediscusser and clarification for the readers.