Experimental and Analytical Aspects of Strain Localization for Cohesive Frictional Materials

Dayakar Penumadu: Professor, Department of Civil and Environ. Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996, USA Ajanta Sachan: Former graduate student, Department of Civil and Environ. Engineering, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996, USA Amit Prashant: Assistant Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, UP 208016, India

Acknowledgements: Financial support from the National Science Foundation (NSF) through grants CMS-9872618 and CMS-0296111 is gratefully acknowledged. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this presentation are those of authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of NSF.
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Digital image analysis (DIA) for studying the strain localization

Cast-acrylic Cell Clay specimen water

Vertical Co-ordinate

10 mm Zone of measurement

Shear Band (a) Before Loading (b) Uniform Deformation (c) Strain Localization

Circumferential co-ordinate

Deformation of a soil element

Triaxial Clay specimen

Digital Imaging setup

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Strain contour plots for solid cylindrical specimens of Kaolin clay

8.00 -0.04 7.00 -0.06 6.00
6.00 7.00 -0.06 -0.08 -0.10 -0.12 8.00 -0.04

-0.08 -0.10 -0.12 -0.14

5.00

5.00

4.00

4.00

3.00

3.00

Initiation of shear band

-0.14 -0.16

2.00

Relatively Uniform Deformation

-5.00 -4.00 -3.00 -2.00 -1.00 0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00

-0.16
2.00

-0.18

-0.18 -5.00 -4.00 -3.00 -2.00 -1.00 0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00

Contour plot for 6% global axial strain

8.00

Local strain Values

Contour plot for 11% global axial strain

Local strain Values

-0.04 7.00

Zone A
6.00

-0.06 -0.08 -0.10

Zone B
5.00

= Angle of orientation of shear band

= Global strain at shear band formation
sb

4.00

Formation of shear band

-0.12 -0.14 -0.16

3.00

= Maximum local strain

m

2.00 -0.18 -5.00 -4.00 -3.00 -2.00 -1.00 0.00 1.00 2.00 3.00 4.00

Contour plot for 14% global axial strain

Local strain Values

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Shear banding in Kaolin clay specimens using Lubricated end triaxial setup

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Observed Strain Localization within the Cubical Specimens during True Triaxial Testing

Undeformed Specimen Shear Banding at Failure

Defused Localization

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Onset of Localization: Variation in Sum of Principal Strains

SUM OF PRINCIPAL STRAINS, 1 + 2 + 3 (% ) -12
0.0
b=1.0 b=0.75 b=0.5

-9 -6 -3 0 -3 -6 0 3 6 9

b=0.5 b=0.75

b=1.0

-0.3 -0.6 -0.9 -1.2 3 5 7 9

- Failure Location
.

b=0.25

b=0

12

15

18

MAJOR PRINCIPAL STRAIN,1 (%)

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Deformation Under Flexible Boundary Condition

Center area (Shaded) on each face deformed slightly more than the corner and edge area (Not shaded) Pre-failure deformations were uniform on the center of the faces Localization developed near failure produces non-uniformity on the surfaces

These marks represent the location for Measurement of deformation.

Non-uniformity in deformation Deformation profile

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Sudden Failure Response of Clay Specimens Due to Strain Localization

The pre-failure elasto-plastic deformation in most constitutive theories is modelled by considering its strong relationship with failure stress state parameters. It is assumed that when a soil element is subjected to shear loading, it yields consistently following a hardening rule and smoothly reaches a stress state where continuously decreasing shear stiffness becomes zero, which the authors define as a reference state. A series of true triaxial experiments performed during this study suggest that the strain localization occurs during hardening of clay, which leads to a sudden failure response within the specimen. In the absence of localized deformation, the soil element may sustain higher stress and eventually reach the reference state.
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Strain Localization and Sudden Failure Response

During triaxial undrained shearing, the specimens of Kaolin clay experienced localized deformations in the form of thin shear bands and/or local bulging at the peak shear stress location. Due to localized deformations, the specimen experienced an abrupt loss of the shear stiffness at peak shear stress and showed a sudden failure.

Reference State Smooth Failure Sudden Failure

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Concept of Reference State and its Significance

The strain localization may have a relationship with the constitutive properties of soil; however, it is also largely influenced by many other factors such as specimen boundary and material imperfections. Due to strain localizations, soil elements may show early failure and reach the critical state before the shear stiffness decreases to zero i.e. before reaching the reference stress state. These sudden failure conditions (caused by strain localization) might be independent of the soil properties defining the pre-failure elasto-plastic yielding of clay. A constitutive theory developed for such clay should define its formulation of material-yielding independent of the failure surface. The failure surface may be defined as a lower bound for the Reference surface (especially in deviatoric plane), and that would ensure the applicability of the definition of failure at peak deviatoric stress.
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Failure Surface and Reference State in Deviatoric Plane

The failure envelop could be reasonably described using the I3 = constant (for a deviatoric plane) surface for both the OCR values. The reference stress states followed a different pattern than the failure points in deviatoric plane, and the surface connecting these reference states was observed between the I3 and J2 surfaces.
z OCR=1

z OCR=5

I3 surface Experimental reference surface

J2' surface

J2' surface

. 3 I 3 = 1. 2
q2 = J2 3
Reference state Failure point

I3 surface Experimental reference surface

x
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x
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y
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Condition of Continuous Bifurcation in Elastoplastic Material

The classical elastoplasticity theory defines the following tangential constitutive relationships. Elasticity, Elastic stiffness, Elastoplasticity, Elastoplastic stiffness,

= E: Eijkl = ij kl + ( ik jl + il jk ) = D: D = E E:P Q :E H +Q:E:P g g

where, Q =

and

P=

Here, f is the yield function, g is the plastic potential, and is the Euclidian norm of the tensor.

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Condition of Continuous Bifurcation in Elastoplastic Material

Loss of Ellipticity:
The theory of localization defines the condition of continuous bifurcation for elastoplastic deformations across the shear band based on the vanishing of the determinant of acoustic tensor, which is derived from the constitutive stiffness tensor. normal to the shear band, the elastic acoustic tensor B e , and For a unit vector n elastoplastic acoustic tensor B is defined using the equations below.

En Be = n

and

Dn B=n

The hardening modulus corresponding to the loss of ellipticity Hle is determined as

) E1 ( n E : P ) (Q : E : P ) H le = ( Q : E n

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Condition of Continuous Bifurcation in Elastoplastic Material

Loss of Strong Ellipticity:
For a nonassociative elastoplastic model (f g), the stiffness tensor D and the acoustic tensors B are not symmetric, and the condition of bifurcation is defined by the vanishing of the symmetric part of the acoustic tensor (loss of strong ellipticity),

det B sym = 0. In such condition, the hardening modulus Hlse is determined as

1 : n Q E E ( ) sym ( n E : P ) + 1 = 1/ 2 1/ 2 ( Q : E : P ) 1 1 2 {( P : E n ) E sym ( n E : P )} {( Q : E n ) E sym ( n E : Q )}

H lse

The occurrence of shear banding and its orientation is obtained by searching the largest . critical hardening modulus and the corresponding unit vector n

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A Nonassociative Elastoplastic Model

The analysis presented in this paper is based on a nonassociative elastoplastic constitutive model developed by the authors. A detailed description of the proposed model can be found in Prashant and Penumadu [3]. Following are the key components of the model.

Yield Surface: Plastic Potential: Mapping Variable:

p ) f = ( q p ) L2 ln ( po
2

p g = 2 1 p po

g = ng 1 q

= q qy
p ) q y = C y p ( po
o

Reference state shear stress:

is mean effective pre-consolidation stress, 3 ) is mean effective stress, po Here, p ( = I1 ) is deviatoric stress, L is a state variable, and , ng, Cy, and o are material q ( = 3J 2
constants.

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Loss of Ellipticity vs. Loss of Strong Ellipticity

0 0 Normalized Hardeing Modulus -0.1 -0.2 -0.3 -0.4 -0.5 -0.6 -0.7
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10

15

Major principal Strain (%)

OCR = 1 Hlse/G Hle/G

OCR = 5

Strain Localization Analysis using Concept of the Loss of Strong Ellipticity

0.4 Normalized Hardeing Modulus 0.2 0 0 -0.2 -0.4 -0.6 -0.8
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OCR = 1

H/G

5
= 35 = 40

10 15 Major principal Strain (%)

= 42 = 42
Plane of possible shear banding

1' 3'

Hlse/G
H = Hardening modulus of the clay Hlse = Critical Hardening modulus

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Comments on Strain Localization

According to the theory of the vanishing of the acoustic tensor, the onset of shear band type strain localization in a soil element occurs when H = Hlse. This condition was never achieved during hardening regime for the model to predict the onset of localization, which is consistent with the findings of Rudnicki and Rice [5] using a generalized and simple constitutive law for soils and rocks. The angle calculations may not match with the experimentally observed as the theory did not predict shear banding at all. In compression mode it was difficult to observe shear banding visually; however, indirect methods suggested some kind of strain localization at the peak shear stress location. It should also be noted that some other modes of instabilities might occur before shear banding, such as the growing nonuniformities due to undrained instability under globally undrained but locally drained conditions, Rice [4].
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Conclusions

A series of triaxial shear tests using different specimen shapes and loading/boundary conditions were performed in this study, and they all indicated the occurrence of strong strain localization zones within a deforming specimen near the peak shear stress location. New techniques have been developed for identifying the onset of strain localization, which is important to consider for modeling the initiation of catastrophic failures in geotechnical structures. It was found that mere implementation of thin shear band type strain localization theory for a single homogeneous soil element does not provide sufficient condition for modeling the sudden failures triggered by localized deformations as observed in the experiments.
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References Bardet, JP. A comprehensive review of strain localization in elastoplastic soils. Computers and Geotechniques 1990; 10:163-188. Neilsen, MK, Schreyer, HL. Bifurcations in elastic-plastic materials. Int. J. Solids Struct 1993; 30:521-544. Prashant, A, Penumadu, D. Modeling the effect of overconsolidation on shear behavior of cohesive soils. In: Proc. 9th Symp. Num. Models in Geomech., Ottawa, Canada, 2004; 131-137. Rice, RJ. On the stability of dilatant hardening of structured rock masses. J. Geophys. Research 1975; 80(11):1531-1536. Rudnicki, JW, Rice, JR. Conditions for the localization of deformation in pressure-sensitive dilatant materials. J. Mech. Phys. Solids 1975; 23:371394. Szab, L. Comments on loss of strong ellipticity in elastoplasticity. Int. J. Solids and Structures 2000; 37:3775-3806
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