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A hydro-mechanical mechanism for cyclic ratcheting of embedded cantilever retaining walls in saturated sand
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DOI：10.1007/s11440-026-03184-2.png)
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Abstract
En 中文
Saturated backfills behind embedded cantilever walls deform through coupled hydro-mechanical processes that pseudo-static methods cannot capture. Three 40 g dynamic centrifuge tests are presented to isolate how the pre-seismic static state, set by wall flexural stiffness, together with motion intensity, governs cyclic response, fluid migration, and permanent wall demand. Two models used different wall stiffness under the same motion; a third used the stiffer wall with higher peak acceleration. Full-field imaging, pore pressure transducers and accelerometers were combined with stress–strain loops and effective-stress paths, together with a spin-up-based estimate of the near-wall static-shear state. The flexible wall mobilized smaller near-wall static shear and started closer to an active condition, producing a contractive, softening zone next to the wall with excess pore pressure ratios approaching 0.8, late-shaking upward redistribution followed by near-surface excess pore pressure retention, and the largest permanent wall translation. The stiffer wall mobilized larger near-wall static shear and remained closer to an at-rest condition, generating repeated dilative drops (negative excess pore pressure), thereby limiting sustained upward redistribution; the effective-stress path rarely approached the critical state line, and the residual wall deformation remained small. With the same stiffness but higher input acceleration, early dilation at the wall was overcome by a strongly contractive free field: isochrones and image-based volumetric strain maps show lateral inflow toward the wall followed by upward redistribution along the interface, which suppressed strong passive pulses, broadened the near-surface deformation zone, shifted the maximum moment upward, and increased permanent wall translation. These observations are consolidated in a conceptual mechanism linking the pre-seismic static state and motion intensity to the direction of pore pressure migration and the overall wall deformation mechanism. The proposed mechanism provides system-scale evidence that the near-wall response is governed by the combined pre-seismic static-shear bias and motion intensity: higher static bias promotes dilation and limited residual wall demand under moderate shaking, whereas stronger shaking can override early dilation and drive contractive softening with lateral inflow and upward redistribution along the interface, producing larger permanent wall translation.
Keywords:
Cantilever retaining wall
Centrifuge modeling
Cyclic deformation
Earthquakes
Initial state
Pore pressure
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