Experimental investigation on the damping characteristics in dry and saturated sands

An experimental study of the behavior of sandy soils having different densities was conducted under the action of a single impulsive load. Dry silica sands of different densities and saturated sand were tested. Different falling masses from different heights were conducted using the falling weight deflectometer to provide the single pulse energy. Variation of damping with different parameters was examined, these are; footing embedment, depth to diameter ratios, diameter of the impact plate, the applied energy and soil density (dense, medium, and loose) in addition to moisture content (dry or saturated sands). The variation of soil density leads to increase the damping ratio increases by about 20-80% when the soil density is varied from loose to dense.