Indoor tests of sensor-enabled piezoelectric geocable–geogrid composite structure for slope rehabilitation and monitoring

Abstract

Sensor-enabled piezoelectric geocables were combined with a geogrid to acquire a sensor-enabled piezoelectric geogrid (SPGG) based on the impedance–strain relationship. Tension, pullout, and straight shear tests were conducted on this SPGG configuration. The tension test results indicated that the tensile strain–normalized impedance curves were exponential in form within the first 7 % of strain and the rate of shift in impedance was independent of the tension loading rate. An excellent correspondence between the peak strength and impedance inflection point was observed in the results of the pullout and straight shear tests. Additional validation of the proposed SPGG was conducted through a collapse test of the reinforced soil slope model. The results indicated that the SPGG-obtained strains were similar to actual strain gauge measurements but provided a larger measurement range and that the SPGG was able to sense real-time vibrations during the slope collapse using a voltage analysis, confirming that the proposed SPGG can simultaneously provide soil reinforcement, strain monitoring of reinforcement materials, and vibration sensing. This research is expected to inform the development of a dynamic and static monitoring, large range, and accurate method for monitoring the conditions of reinforced soil over their entire lifecycles.