The Xiaqu Hydropower Station is a large hydroelectric project in western China. The right abutment of its dam comprises deep soil strata, with the underlying layers being a glacial gravelly soil layer and an alluvial sandy soil layer. Given that glacial gravel is typically internally unstable soil, significant concerns have been raised regarding the long-term safety against seepage erosion risks. To investigate this, a large-scale seepage apparatus was utilized to study the internal erosion behavior of the glacial soil layer as well as the contact erosion behavior between the alluvial and glacial soil layers under high surcharge pressures. The test results demonstrated that when the hydraulic gradient surpassed 0.1 to 0.2, the glacial soil exhibited pronounced fine particle loss, which corroborated the geometric criteria-based judgment of its internal instability. Moreover, it was found that increasing the surcharge pressure could partially alleviate the extent of internal erosion. In contrast, despite the geometric criteria suggesting a low likelihood of contact erosion, it was, in fact, observed during the large-scale experiments. This was due to the severe internal erosion within the glacial gravel, which altered its gradation and subsequently enlarged the void constrictions. These findings underscore the crucial importance of conducting seepage erosion tests to validate the contact erosion characteristics beyond mere reliance on geometric criteria. The test results thereby provided valuable reference for the selection of seepage erosion control measures and the evaluation of seepage erosion safety for the project.
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