SHEAR STRENGTH

Shearing stresses tend to displace a part of the soil mass relative to the rest of soil mass. Shear
strength of a soil is the capacity of the soil to resist the shearing stresses. The shear failure of a
soil mass occurs when the shear stresses induced due to applied compressive load exceed the
shear strength of the soil. It may be noted that the failure in soil occurs due to the relative
movement of the soil particles and not by the breaking of the particles.
Shear strength of a soil governs the bearing capacity, the stability of the slope, the earth
pressure against the retaining structures.

Stress at a point: Mohr circle of stresses-

In a stressed soil mass, shear failure can occur along any plane and hence it is necessary to
study the stress conditions at a point in such a mass. In general, a soil mass is subjected to a 3-
D stress system. However, in many soil engineering problems, the stresses in the third direction
are not relevant and the stress system is simplified as 2-D. The plane strain condition are
generally assumed in which the strain in the third (longitudinal) direction is zero. Such
conditions exist, for example, under a strip footing of a long retaining wall.
At any stressed point, there exist three mutually perpendicular planes on which there are no
shearing stresses acting. These are known as the principal planes. The normal stresses that act
on these planes are called as principal stresses; the largest is called as major principal stress
(s1), smallest is called as minor principal stresses (s3). The corresponding planes are called as
major, minor and intermediate planes, respectively.

The critical stress values generally occur on the plane normal to the intermediate plane. Hence,
the state of stress in the plane containing s1 and s3 will be considered.

Normal stress = s =
!" #!$
+
!"( !$
Cos 2𝜃 s1
% %
!" ( !$
Shear stress = s = %
Sin 2𝜃

s t
s3 s3

𝜃
!" ( !$
%

t s1

𝜃 2𝜃
s3
s1
!"#!$
%
s
Mohr-circle
Basic concept of shearing resistance and shear strength:

Consider a prismatic block resisting on a plane surface MN. The block Pn

subject to a force Pn which acts right angle to plane MN and a force Fa
Fa acts tangentially to the plane. M
The normal force Pn remains constant whereas Fa gradually increases Fr N
from zero to a value which will cause sliding. If Fa is small, the block d
will remain at rest, and the Fa will be balanced by an equal and dm
opposite force Fr on the plane of contact. The angle d formed by the
resultant R of the two forces Fr and Pn with the normal to the plane
MN is known as angle of obliquity. Fa = Pntan dm

Block will start sliding along the plane when the force Fa reaches a value which will increase
the angle of obliquity to a certain maximum value of dm. If the block and the plane surface
MN are made of same material, the angle dm is equal to f which is called the angle of friction
and the value tan f is termed as coefficient of friction.

Mohr-Columb Failure Criteria:

The shear failure occurs in soils by slippage of the particles due to the shear stresses. The failure
is essentially by shear, but shear stresses at failure depends upon the normal stresses on the
potential failure plane. According to Mohr, failure is caused by acritical combination of the
normal and shear stresses.
Thus, the functional relationship between normal stress and shear stress on a failure plane can
be expressed in the following form,

tf = f(s)

If data from several tests, carried out on several samples up to failure is available, a series of
Mohr circles, each circle representing the data from one test, can be plotted. A line tangential
to all the circles is Mohr’s failure envelope. Mohr envelope is unique for a given material.

t t

curved
straight line
Not possible Mohr failure envelope
Failure

Stable

s s
Any Mohr circle which does not cross the failure envelop and lies below the envelop represents
a stable condition (non-failure). The Mohr circle can not cross the Mohr envelop as the failure
would have already occurred as soon as the Mohr circle touched the envelop.
The failure envelope defined by the above equation is a curve line. Coulomb (1776) replaced
the Mohr envelope by a straight line. This linear function can be written as,
tf = c + s tan f
c = Cohesion, f = Angle of internal friction, s = Normal stress, tf = Shear stress
Coulomb observed that one component if the shearing strength is called as intrinsic cohesion,
is constant for a given soil and is independent of applied stress. The other component, namely
the frictional resistance, varies directly as the magnitude of the normal stress.
c and f are also called as shear strength parameters of the soil.
c and f related to the test conditions under which these are measured.
Revised Mohr-Coulomb Equation:
The parameters c and f are not necessarily fundamentals properties of the soil. These
parameters depend upon a number of factors such as water content, drainage condition of
testing. Terzaghi established that the normal which controls the shear strength of the soil are
the effective stresses and not the total stresses,
tf = c’ + s' tan f'
c’ = Cohesion intercept in terms of effective stress, f' = Angle of internal friction in terms of
effective stress, s' = Normal stress, tf = Shear stress
this equation is known as revised Mohr-Coulomb equation.
Different types of tests and drainage condition
The following tests are used to measure the shear strength of a soil,
i) Direct shear test ii) Triaxial compression test iii) Unconfined compression test iv) Shear
vane test

The shear test must be conducted under appropriate drainage condition that simulate the actual
field problem. In a shear test, there are two stages;
i) Consolidation stage in which the confining pressure is applied to the specimen and
it is allowed to consolidate
ii) Shear stage in which the shear stress is applied
Depends upon the drainage conditions, there are three type tests as explained below;
i) Unconsolidated - Undrained Condition: No drainage is permitted during
consolidation stage. The drainage is also not permitted during the shear stage.
As no time is allowed for consolidation or dissipation of excess pore water pressure,
the test can be conducted quickly in a few minutes. The test is known as
Unconsolidated-Undrained (UU) or quick (Q) test.
ii) Consolidated – Undrained Condition: The specimen is allowed to consolidated
in the first stage. The drainage is permitted until the consolidation is complete.
in the second stage when the specimen is sheared, no drainage is permitted. The test
is known as Consolidated-Undrained (CU) test. It is also known as R-test.
iii) Consolidated- Drained Condition: In this test the drainage of the specimen is
permitted in both the stages. The sample is allowed to consolidate in the first stage.
 When the consolidation is complete, it is sheared at a very slow rate to ensure that
fully drained conditions exists and excess pore water pressure zero. This is known
as CD or Slow (S) test.

Mode of application of shear force:

The shear force in a shear test is applied either by increasing the shear displacement at a given
rate by increasing the shear force at a given rate. Accordingly, the shear tests are either strain-
controlled or stress-controlled.
i) Strain controlled test: In this test, the shearing strain increase at a given rate.
Generally, the rate of increase in shearing strain is kept constant.
Most of the shear tests are conducted as strain-controlled. The stress-strain
characteristics are easily obtained in these test, as the shape of the stress-strain curve
beyond the peak point can be observed only in a strain-controlled test. A strain-
controlled test is easier to perform than a stress-controlled test.

ii) Stress-controlled test: In this test, the shear force is increased at a given rate. The
rate of increase of the shear force is maintained constant. The shear load is increased
such that the shear stress increase at a uniform rate.

Stress-controlled tests are preferred for conducting shear test at a very low rate, because an
applied load can easily be kept constant for any given period of time. The stress-controlled test
represents the field conditions more closely.

Kindly refer to the attached pdf files for the Testing Methodology to determine various
shear strength parameters.