Artigo
Energy efficiency for standard penetration tests
Fecha
2005-10-01Registro en:
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering. Reston: Asce-amer Soc Civil Engineers, v. 131, n. 10, p. 1252-1263, 2005.
1090-0241
10.1061/(ASCE)1090-0241(2005)131:10(1252)
WOS:000232044000007
Autor
State Univ Santa Catarina
Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS)
Universidade Estadual Paulista (Unesp)
Resumen
The need for standardization of the measured blow count number N-spt into a normalized reference energy value is now fully recognized. The present paper extends the existing theoretical approach using the wave propagation theory as framework and introduces an analysis for large displacements enabling the influence of rod length in the measured N-spt values to be quantified. The study is based on both calibration chamber and field tests. Energy measurements are monitored in two different positions: below the anvil and above the sampler. Both experimental and numerical results demonstrate that whereas the energy delivered into the rod stem is expressed as a ratio of the theoretical free-fall energy of the hammer, the effective sampler energy is a function of the hammer height of fall, sampler permanent penetration, and weight of both hammer and rods. Influence of rod length is twofold and produces opposite effects: wave energy losses increase with increasing rod length and in a long rod composition the gain in potential energy from rod weight is significant and may partially compensate measured energy losses. Based on this revised approach, an analytical solution is proposed to calculate the energy delivered to the sampler and efficiency coefficients are suggested to account for energy losses during the energy transference process.