• International Journal of Highway Engineering
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.41-48
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• 2008

This paper deals with the characteristics of earth pressure to the debris-fall prevention walls which usually are installed in front of steep slope. Such walls have narrow backfill width where the active soil wedge can not be developed fully. The earth pressure to such walls ue affected by the movement of wall and arching effects due to the friction developing on the surface of adjacent ground slope and wall and therefore cannot be analyzed and calculated reliably. The study is carried out through laboratory model tests using centrifuge test. Test results reveal that the earth pressure to the debris-fall prevention wall depends largely on the inclination angle of the ground slope and the wall movement. The earth pressure reduction due to wall movement was observed at the upper half of wall, while the arching effect was significant at the lower half especially in the case of steep ground slope. It can be said that from the result of this study in the design of a debris-fall prevention wall the earth pressure should be determined considering the inclination of ground slope and the condition of wall movement during and after construction.