Relative density of sand in physical modeling using multi-curtain pluviator

Subject Areas : Soil-Structure Interaction

behrad bakhtiari ¹ , arash razmkhah ² , faradjollah Askari ³ , hasan ghasemzadeh ⁴

1 - Department of Civil Engineering, TS.C., Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
2 - Department of Civil Engineering, TS.C., Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran
3 - Department of geotechnical engineering, iiees university
4 - civil engineering, K.N. Toosi University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

Received: 2025-05-06 Accepted : 2025-05-20 Published : 2025-07-05

Keywords: Sedimentation, multi-curtain, Models (Physical), Relative density, Traveling pluviator. Notations,

Abstract :

The physical modeling of homogeneous sand with specific relative density has an important role in studying the behavior of cohesionless soils in the geotechnical engineering. In this research, a new method i.e. multi curtain pluviator, based on the air pluviation method, has been developed. Traveling pluviator with one, two, three, and four longitudinal slits on pluviation plates, have been used to prepare large-scale sand specimens. The effects of different parameters such as the number of longitudinal slits, pluviator traveling speed, falling height of sand on the relative density of a Firuzkuh sand (#161) have been considered. In this method, a wide range of relative densities can be obtained. The comparison of results of tests on the plats with different number of longitudinal slits showed that the increase in deposition intensity in a constant-speed pluviator with an increasing number of pluviation curtains has an insignificant effect on the relative density. investigation of different separation distance of longitudinal slits it has been demonstrated that when pluviation curtains are separated enough, it is possible to achieve the target relative densities in a shorter time and provides reproducibility of target density.

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