Shear Resistance Evolution of Geogrid Reinforced Expansive Soil Under Freeze-Thaw Cycles

Expansive soils have significant characteristics of expansion by water absorption, contraction by water loss. Under the freeze-thaw (F-T) cycles, the engineering diseases are more significant, and the serious geotechnical engineering incidents are induced extremely easily. The aim is to investigate the mechanical response characteristics of geogrid-reinforced expansive soils (GRES) under F-T cycles. Based on a series of large-scale temperature-controlled triaxial tests, influencing factors were considered, such as the number of F-T cycles, the geogrid layers, and the confining pressure. The results showed that: (1) Friction between the expansive soil and geogrid and the geogrid's embedded locking effect indirectly provided additional pressure, limited shear deformation. With the increase in reinforced layers, the stress-strain curve changed from a strain-softening to a strain-hardening type. (2) Elastic modulus, cohesion, and friction angle decreased significantly with increasing number of F-T cycles, whereas dynamic equilibrium was reached after six F-T cycles. (3) The three-layer reinforced specimens showed the best performance of F-T resistance, compared to the plain soil, the elastic modulus reduction amount decreases from 35.7% to 18.3%, cohesion from 24.5% to 14.3%, and friction angle from 7.6% to 4.5%. (4) A modified Duncan-Zhang model with the confining pressure, the F-T cycles, and the geogrid layers was proposed; the predicted values agreed with the measured values by more than 90%, which can be used as a prediction formula for the stress-strain characteristics of GRES under freeze-thaw cycling conditions. The research results can provide important theoretical support for the practical engineering design of GRES in cold regions.