Abstract
In the companion paper, the nonlinear consolidation of soft clays subjected to cyclic loading was analytically investigated. This paper reports the results of an experimental program conducted to verify some critical assumptions made in the analytical study. It, also, includes a numerical study carried out to examine the capability of the proposed theory to determine the consolidation characteristics of soft clays subjected to cyclic loading. Results show that the permeability of the soft clays does not significantly change during the cyclic loading. It is also shown that, compared to the Terzaghi's solution for a linear clay, the inherit nonlinearity of the clay tends to decrease the degree of consolidation due to the smaller rate of dissipation in the excess pore water pressure.