Influence of cyclic consolidation spherical stress on deformation behavior of saturated sand under constant deviatoric stress

The stress–strain behavior under the stress path of constant deviatoric stress was important to evaluate the deformation of embankment dams and slopes due to the variation of water level. The triaxial tests of cyclic spherical stress with constant deviatoric stress were conducted on Fujian standard sand. Under the condition of the same consolidation deviatoric stress and the amplitude of cyclic spherical stress, the influence of cyclic consolidation spherical stress on the stress–strain relationships of saturated sand was preliminarily discussed. The test results indicated that the influence of consolidation spherical stress on the shear strain is much greater than that on the volumetric strain. Under the same consolidation deviatoric stress conditions, when the consolidation spherical stress pc enhances, the variation amplitude of volumetric strain significantly reduces. However, in the lnp–εv space, the volumetric strain curves of different consolidation spherical stress almost coincide with each other. After the same number of cycles, the accumulative volumetric strain under different consolidation spherical stress differs little. Under the same other stress conditions, the normalized spherical stress (p/pc) of different consolidation spherical stress is consistent with the volumetric strain. When the consolidation spherical stress pc is enhanced, under the same spherical stress increment, the increase in shear strain considerably reduces and the cumulative amount of shear strain considerably decreases. The enhancement in consolidation spherical stress inhibits the development of soil shear deformation. Under the condition of the same stress path length, the development of cumulative shear strain is closely related to the consolidation stress ratio. © 2021, Saudi Society for Geosciences.