Yielding and shear behaviour of cement-treated dredged materials

Abstract The mechanical behaviour of three cement-treated dredged materials (DM) was studied in the laboratory by isotropic compression and undrained triaxial tests. The intrinsic properties of the untreated and reconstituted soil were used as a reference framework to interpret the effect of cementation on the mechanical behaviour of the cement-treated DM. The isotropic compression line of the reconstituted soil is termed the intrinsic normal compression line (INCL). It is found that the isotropic compression lines of the cement-treated DM lie above the INCL, i.e. the void ratio of the cement-treated soil is higher than that of the reconstituted soil for a given confining pressure. The yield stress measured from the isotropic compression tests increases with increasing cement content and curing time. The pre-yield and post-yield shear responses of the cement-treated DM are different. Pre-yield soil specimens show a tendency to dilate, but post-yield soil specimens show a tendency to contract. Failure envelopes of the cement treated DM lie above that of the reconstituted DM. Linear Mohr–Coulomb failure envelopes were observed for the range of applied stress used in the study. The cohesion intercept increases with increasing cement content and curing time. The strength enhancement of the cement-treated DM is the result of the structures developed during cementation process. Based on a recently proposed soil water transfer model, the change in normalised bound water content, (Δ m bw ) N , is used to evaluate the combined effects of cement content and curing period on the mechanical behaviour of the cement-treated DM. It is found that there exists a threshold value of (Δ m bw ) N , beyond which the yield stress and cohesion intercept increases nonlinearly with increasing (Δ m bw ) N . The threshold value is equal to 0.37 for the three DM used in the study.