New Formulations for Dynamic Behavior of Sand-Waste Tire Mixtures in a Small Range of Strain Amplitudes

This paper describes the results of a series of cyclic triaxial tests on sand - waste tire mixtures, and applications of genetic programming (GP) and stepwise regression (SR) for the prediction of damping ratio and shear modulus of the mixtures tested. In the tests, shear modulus, and damping ratio of the geomaterials were measured for a strain range of 0.0001% up to 0.04%. The input variables in the developed GP and SR models are the waste tire content (0%, 10%, 20%, and 30%), waste tire type (tire crumbs or tire buffings), strain, and confining pressures (40 kPa, 100 kPa, and 200 kPa), and outputs are shear modulus and damping ratio. Test results show that the shear modulus and the damping ratio of the mixtures are strongly influenced by the waste tire inclusions. The performance of the proposed GP models (R2 = 0.95 for shear modulus, and R2 = 0.94 for damping ratio) are observed to be more accurate than that of the SR models (R2 = 0.87 for shear modulus, and R2 = 0.91 for damping ratio)

Numerical modeling of the nonlinear mechanical behavior of multilayer geosynthetic system for piggyback landfill expansions

This paper was accepted for publication in the journal Geotextiles and Geomembranes and the definitive published version is available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.geotexmem.2016.07.004.Numerical modelling techniques have been increasingly used to assess the integrity of engineering works, such as landfills, that involve interactions between multiple geosynthetics GSYs). In piggyback landfill expansions (PBLEs), where a new landfill is built over an older one, such interactions are particularly important because multiple GSYs, natural materials, and waste interact with each over. To obtain reliable numerical results, the real mechanical behavior of the GSYs and of the interfaces between GSYs must be considered. Designers, however, often use simplistic assumptions without further analyzing the implications of these assumptions on the results. Such simplifications mainly concern the nonlinear axial stiffness of GSYs, the strain softening at interfaces between GSYs, and the difference between the compressive and tensile behavior of GSYs. By, considering these key aspects, the present study aims to understand the extent to which the results of numerical calculations can be influenced both by the differing compressive and tensile behavior of GSYs and by the assumption of strain softening at interfaces between GSYs. For this purpose, several numerical models are implemented by using the finite-difference code FLAC 2D on a typical PBLE that involves four GSYs and six interfaces. The present work also applies comprehensive, state-of-the-art numerical modelling to study the interactions between multiple layers of GSYs. This study also investigates the nonlinear axial stiffness of GSYs through a series of uniaxial tensile tests. The numerical results show that, if the GSY axial compressive and tensile characteristics are the same, then tensile force is minimized, which induces significant compressive force in the GSYs. The results also indicate that neglecting strain softening at the interface between GSYs affects interface shear stresses, displacements of GSYs at the interface, and the GSY force distribution, potentially rendering the model unrealistic. Including strain softening, however, allows the assessment (location) of unstable areas along the interface where large displacements occur