ABSTRACT
We performed numerical simulation of the cone penetrating process with discrete element method (DEM) coupled with finite difference method (FDM) to investigate the mechanics of granular soil interacted with a cone penetrometer. The efficacy of particle size amplification method to estimate soil physical indexes has yet to be established and it was validated in this work. The effects of cone-particle chamber size, confining stress and sand modulus on cone tip resistance are analyzed. The results show that the effect of confining stress is consistent with the empirical relationship and the cone tip resistance correlates positively with the number of particles contacting with the cone penetrometer. Furthermore, the distribution of radial stress agrees well with the cavity expansion theory that a nearly linear relation between cone tip resistance and radial stress near the cone penetrometer can be observed.
