Date of Award
2017
Document Type
Thesis
Publication Status
Version of Record
Submission Date
October 2026
Thesis/Dissertation Advisor [Chair]
Sobhan, Khaled
Abstract
A transparent soil model of granular fused quartz is developed to study the mechanics of shallow foundations. Soil models, unreinforced and reinforced, prepared at relative densities 0.34 (loose) and 0.64 to 0.69 (medium dense) are tested using a rectangular footing (25 mm wide x 40 mm long) under strain-controlled loading. Digital Image Correlation is used to identify displacements of a seeded central plane parallel to footing width (B) and construct vector fields and contour plots. Fiber-reinforced soil model data analysis is inconclusive. For the unreinforced medium-dense soil, minimum and peak magnitude horizontal displacements occurred directly under the footing at the footing edges; whereas in the loose soil, peak magnitude horizontal displacement occurred directly under the footing. Vector and contour plots revealed that a medium dense soil gradually distributes smaller magnitude displacements over a broad area, in contradistinction to acute, highly localized displacements of larger magnitude in a loose soil.
Extent
127 p.
Recommended Citation
Purdy, Denys W., "Identifying Shallow Foundation Failure Modes and Mechanisms Using Surveillance of a Transparent Granular Soil Surrogate" (2017). Electronic Theses and Dissertations 2010 - 2019. 1711.
https://digitalcommons.fau.edu/etd_general_6/1711
Identifier
FA00004832
Comments
Includes bibliography.|Thesis (M.S.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2017.|FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection|Includes bibliography.