VIBRATION TABLE STUDIES FOR PREDICTION OF LIQUEFACTION _ A CRITICAL STUDY

Abstract

One of the most dramatic causes of damage to engin-eering structures during earthquakes has been the development of Liquefaction in saturated sand deposits,. as evident either by the formation of boils and mud spouts at the ground su rf aC a or seepage of water through ground cracks and also by the development of quick sand like conditions. Where the latter phenomenon occurs, buildings may sink" substan-tially into the ground surface and foundation may displace laterally causing structural failures. The review of literature shows that Liquefaction has been the main cause , of catestro-phic damage to the structures during the earthquakes. For prediction of liquefaction possibility in the field, many works have been done in the past. A compre-hensive work has been done on small samples under triaxial and simple shear conditions under loading conditions. Few investigations have been done on large size samples, on vibration tables. But no uniform agreement has been achieved from different tests - performed by different investigations to date. The method proposed by Gupta. (1977) takes into account the progressive nature of liquefaction while predicting the possibility of liquefaction at a site. Although a compre- hensive test data was collected earlier but the effect- of tank size was not studied.