Study on Fatigue Damage Characteristics of a Cement-Stabilized Soil for the Composite Foundation of Immersed Tunnels

Composite foundations involving cement-stabilized soils are often adopted for immersed tunnels. In this paper, the cumulative damage characteristics of cement-stabilized soil were studied considering long-term traffic vibration loads. In total, four sets of dynamic fatigue damage tests with different cement contents and stress levels were carried out by applying an asymmetric sine-wave cyclic dynamic load. The fatigue cumulative damage characteristics and damage failure modes of the cement-stabilized soil were analyzed based on Miner's linear elastic fatigue cumulative damage theory. The correlation between the cyclic loading stress levels and the fatigue life Nf of the cement-stabilized soil was obtained, revealing the fatigue damage developing characteristics of the cement-stabilized soil.