Shear Characteristics of Cement-Stabilized Silty Clay under Negative Temperature Curing

Cement-stabilized soil is widely-used to improve mechanical properties of soils in cold regions. For the safety operation and maintenance of geotechnical engineering, it is important to clarify the main control factors of shear strength and the change mechanism of shear characteristics for cement-stabilized soil cured at negative temperatures. In this paper, the shear characteristics of cement-stabilized silty clay were tested under different curing temperatures, cement content, initial water content, and curing age. The influencing factors and variation rules of the shear strength for cement-stabilized silty clay under negative curing temperature were analyzed. The test results show that the shear strength of cement-stabilized soil under negative curing temperature is less than that under positive curing temperature. The pore characteristics of cement-stabilized soil are significantly different under different curing temperatures, which makes the shear failure morphology of cement-stabilized soil shows different degrees of brittleness effect. Besides, initial cement content and initial water content significantly affect the shear strength of cement-stabilized soils, and its shear strength increases with the cement content raised, the optimal initial water content of 16% ~ 20% is the most favorable for the strength growth with cement-stabilized soil. Additionally, the cohesion of cement-stabilized soil increases with the cement content, and firstly increases and then decreases with the initial water content. With the increase of cement content and initial water content, the internal friction angle also firstly increases and then decreases.