DETERMINATION OF SHEAR WAVE VELOCITY BY BENDER ELEMENTS USING VARIABLE-PATH LENGTH METHOD

Tirawat Boonyatee, Kok-Hooi Chan and Toshiyuki Mitachi

ABSTRACT: For determining shear wave velocity by bender elements, several types of travel time methods have been proposed and are being used commonly. Although the methods have been established over a period of time, there are still many aspects that need to be improved. For example, the ambiguity of arrival time due to near-field effect and the distance measurement for soft sample during testing installation. This study seeks to propose an alternative method which could minimise such ambiguities. In this regard, a method called variable-path length method is proposed, which uses a continuous sinusoidal wave instead of a pulse wave, is applied to a series of tests on reconstituted Kasaoka clay in a modified triaxial apparatus. Based on the results, it is verified that the proposed method can measure shear wave velocity without the ambiguity of arrival time and independent of initial distance between transmitter and receiver. In addition, the proposed method has an advantage to determine phase velocity of shear wave at arbitrary frequency which is useful to study the frequency dependence of geomaterials.

Key words : clay, continuous sinusoidal wave, laboratory test, shear wave velocity, variable-path length method (IGC: D6)