Effect of Cement Content on the Deformation Properties of Cemented Sand and Gravel Material

Abstract

Knowing the deformation properties of cemented sand and gravel (CSG) material can help construct reasonable constitutive models for the material, which can be used to simulate the structural performance of various practical projects including CSG dams. In this study, to investigate the effect of cement content on the deformation properties of CSG material, we employ triaxial compressive tests for cement contents of 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100 kg/m3 with a confining pressure range of 0.3–1.2 MPa, and theoretically analyze the results by the regression analysis prediction method. Here, we show that both cement content and confining pressure influence the deformation properties of CSG material: for an increase in cement content, the failure strain decreases and brittleness of CSG material increases; the initial modulus of the CSG material increased exponentially with increasing cement content or confining pressure; the peak volumetric strain and its corresponding axial strain increase linearly with increasing confining pressures, which decrease with increasing cement content; the initial tangent volumetric ratio can also be determined by the peak volumetric strain and its corresponding axial strain.