numerical and experimental study of the optimal location of concrete piles in a saturated sandy slope

The stability of a soil slope, reinforced by a concrete pile, is studied both experimentally and numerically in this work. our study suggests that when the concrete pile is located in the middle of the slope (at x/r = 0.5), the soil structure collapses under a pressure of 10.9 kpa that is the highest overburden pressure to cause instability of the tested reinforced sandy slope. however, when the pile is located in the upslope (at x/r = 0.75) or downslope (at x/r = 0.25), the slope failure occurs under a pressure of 7.8 or 3.12 kpa, respectively. therefore, our experimental work suggests that a pile located at the middle of the slope can provide the optimum reinforcement of the soil structure studied in this work. the nonlinear numerical modeling of the slope was conducted as well. the numerical study shows consistent results with those from the physical observation confirming that the slope mid-point is the optimum place for the slope reinforcement.