Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90

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Computers and Geotechnics

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Numerical modeling of three-dimensional active earth pressure acting

on rigid walls
Florian tom Wörden a,1, Martin Achmus b,⇑
a
Technologiekontor Bremerhaven GmbH, Elbinger Platz 1, D-27570 Bremerhaven, Germany
b
Leibniz University Hannover, Institute for Geotechnical Engineering, Appelstraße 9A, D-30167 Hannover, Germany

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Finite element simulations were carried out to investigate three-dimensional (3D) active earth pressure
Received 17 October 2011 forces on walls in sand. The numerical model was validated by comparison with model test results. In a
Received in revised form 18 February 2013 parametric study the effects of deformation mode, aspect ratio, relative density and wall friction angle on
Accepted 20 February 2013
the load–displacement behavior and in particular on the resultant 3D earth pressure force were investi-
Available online 19 March 2013
gated. A comparison with results from analytical methods showed that in most cases these methods are
very conservative. The three-dimensional element slices theory proposed by Walz and Prager accords
Keywords:
best with the numerically obtained results.
Active earth pressure
Three-dimensional
Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Sand
Finite element method

1. Introduction it was aimed by the authors to identify the relevant influencing

The consideration of active and passive earth pressures is a cen-
tral problem in geotechnical engineering, and so numerous exper-
imental, analytical and numerical investigations have been carried
out in this regard. However, since most earth pressure problems
can be considered in practice as two-dimensional plane strain
problems, the vast majority of the investigations carried out so
far focused on two-dimensional earth pressure.
Furthermore three-dimensional (3D) earth pressure has to be
considered in certain cases. In the active case investigated here,
3D earth pressure is smaller than two-dimensional earth pressure
due to the occurrence of arching effects behind the construction
element under consideration. This leads to smaller loads acting
on the construction element as for instance deep narrow excava-
tion walls or shafts, which should be accounted for in the design
of these structures. In the stability design of slurry-supported
trenches for the installation of diaphragm walls, spatial (3D) effects
must regularly be considered in order to be able to prove the
trench stability.
Regarding the 3D active earth pressure problem, only a limited
number of investigations have been carried out so far. Based on
these, some calculation approaches exist, but the results of the dif-
ferent approaches can significantly differ (see Section 2). Therefore
⇑ Corresponding author. Tel.: +49 511 762 4155; fax: +49 511 762 5105.
E-mail addresses: tomwoerden@tkb-gmbh.de (F. tom Wörden), achmus@igth.-
uni-hannover.de (M. Achmus).
1
Tel.: +49 471 958444 30; fax: +49 471 958444 19.
factors on the 3D active earth pressure by experimental investiga-
tions and a numerical parametric study. With these results an eval-
uation of the calculation approaches is possible.
The problem investigated here is shown in Fig. 1. A rigid wall
with a height h and width b is moved away from the soil body.
The magnitude of the earth pressure force acting on the rigid wall
with a certain height-to-width ratio in homogeneous sand is to be
determined. The height-to-width ratio n = h/b is termed the aspect
ratio. The greater the aspect ratio, the greater is the deviation from
the two-dimensional case. Thus, the aspect ratio is a measure of
the effect of spatiality. This effect is described here by a factor k,
which gives the ratio of the 3D earth pressure force E3D a to the force
for the two-dimensional case (h  b, i.e. n ? 0) E2D a :
E3D
a
k¼ ð1Þ
E2D
a
The magnitude of the earth pressure force is also dependent on
the wall deformation mode. Three deformation modes, namely
parallel movement, head rotation and toe rotation, are considered.
The displacement u is the maximum displacement either occurring
at the top or the bottom of the wall or, in the case of parallel move-
ment, constant over the wall height. The dependence of the resul-
tant earth pressure force on aspect ratio, wall roughness, wall
deformation mode and relative density of the sand is investigated.
Experimental investigations on the 3D active earth pressure
problem can be divided into investigations on slurry-supported
trenches or in comparison to that almost rigid construction ele-

0266-352X/$ - see front matter Ó 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.compgeo.2013.02.004
84 F. tom Wörden, M. Achmus / Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90

Fig. 1. Definition of the investigated 3D active earth pressure problem.

ments as caissons, shafts or retaining walls. In the reviewed litera- consolidated sand. To clearly identify the influence of the investi-
ture the majority of the experimental investigations is focused on gated boundary conditions simplifications with respect to the wall
the installation phase design for diaphragm walls, i.e. stability of deformation mode, wall stiffness and the soil conditions were
slurry-supported trenches. Karstedt [17] showed that the move- made. It has to be mentioned that consideration of a rigid wall is
ment of the sliding wedge is composed of a parallel movement of course a strong idealization of reality. Neither a retaining wall
and a head rotation. Further tests with slurry-supported trenches nor a wall of a slurry-supported trench will undergo pure rigid wall
were carried out by Lutz [19], Lee [18] and Anbarji [2]. deformation modes. In that respect, the study presented here is of
Model tests with caissons were done by Walz [29][30], Jessber- theoretical nature. The results cannot directly be transferred to a
ger et al. [16], Müller-Kirchenbauer et al. [20], Savidis et al. [25]. practical application. The aim of the study is to identify the signif-
Gerlach [8] carried out tests on a model excavation pit in dense icance of different parameters on the 3D load-bearing behavior,
sand and showed that the geometry of the failure wedge occurring which at least helps to assess practical problems.
in the soil is mainly dependent on the aspect ratio and also on the
wall deformation mode. Furthermore, Fuji et al. [7] and Hagiwara 2. Existing calculation approaches
et al. [12] carried out centrifuge model tests regarding the earth
pressure acting on circular shafts in sand. Most of the existing calculation approaches have focused on
Tom Wörden [26] recently conducted model tests with rigid earth pressure forces acting on slurry-supported trenches for dia-
walls in normally consolidated (NC) sand, in which aspect ratio, phragm walls, which means that a wall friction angle da = 0 was as-
deformation mode and relative density of the sand were varied. sumed. The methods of Piaskowski and Kowalewski [23],
A test box with a cross section of 1.20 m  0.805 m and a height Washbourne [32], Tsai and Chang [27], Fox [6] and also the method
of 1.70 m was used. Using a wall b = 0.2 m wide, aspect ratios be- presented in the German standard DIN 4126 [5] should be men-
tween 2 and 8 were realized. The results of these tests were ap- tioned here. It should be noted that these methods can give signif-
plied here to validate the numerical model. icantly different results for the resultant earth pressure force [26].
Based on numerical investigations, the effect of the wall deforma- In the following only methods which can also be applied to
tion mode for the two-dimensional earth pressure problem is reported cases with da > 0, i.e. for rough walls, are explained in more detail,
by Potts and Fourie [24] and Hettler and Abdel-Rahman [13]. Potts and since the results of these methods are compared with the numer-
Fourie [24] applied an elastoplastic material law for the soil and ical results then presented.
showed that in the case of toe rotation compared to the other defor- In the Huder method (1972) [15] the 3D effect on the earth
mation modes significantly larger wall deflections are necessary to pressure is accounted by a reduction factor derived from silo the-
reach the minimum (active) earth pressure and that often no clear ory (Fig. 2):
minimum (peak point) is reached. Hettler and Abdel-Rahman [13]
used a hypoplastic material law – as in this paper – and showed that e3D 0
ah ¼ K ah rz AHud ð2Þ
the two-dimensional active earth pressure force is the smallest for
parallel wall movement and the greatest for head rotation.
Three-dimensional numerical simulations have mostly focused
on the investigation of the processes during the excavation of slur-
ry-supported trenches. Ng and Yan [21,22] calculated the redistri-
bution of stresses in the soil during excavation and compared the
results with measurements. Gourvenec and Powrie [9] investigated
the effect of the aspect ratio on the stress reduction in the soil be-
neath the trench and concluded that 3D effects are fully developed
for aspect ratios n > 3. Gourvenec et al. [10] also simulated the pro-
cesses in the soil during trench excavation, focusing on soil defor-
mations in the evaluation.
The literature review reveals that 3D active earth pressure
problems were investigated experimentally and numerically. Fur-
thermore several calculation approaches can be found, but it has
to be mentioned that neither an identification of the most relevant
influencing factors on the 3D active earth pressure nor a validation
of the calculation approaches with respect of the boundary condi-
tions is given in the reviewed literature.
The present numerical study should provide a contribution to
clarify the influence of the main boundary conditions in normally Fig. 2. System and denominations for the Huder method [15].
 F. tom Wörden, M. Achmus / Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90 85

Fig. 3. System and denominations for the modified theory of element slices of Walz and Prager [31].

Fig. 4. Comparison of results from different calculation methods.

Table 1 the wall is obtained. In contrast to the two-dimensional case, the

Hypoplastic material parameters for sand used in the parametric study. arching factor also affects the magnitude of the resulting earth
Parameter uc (°) hs (MPa) n ed0 ec0 ei0 a b pressure force in the three-dimensional case.
Value 31.7 3300 0.26 0.499 0.789 0.947 0.21 1.0 In the German standard DIN 4085 [4] too, a simple calculation
method for spatial active earth pressure is presented. This method
is mainly based on calculations with the Piaskowski and Kowalew-
1expð2K tan u0 z=bÞ ski method [23], which was also applied to cases with da > 0. From
with AHud ¼ bz y
2K y tan u0
.
Here Kah is the two-dimensional earth pressure coefficient, r0z is the results, the following equation was derived:
the effective vertical stress and z is the depth below soil surface. Ky
is an earth pressure coefficient, which in general should lie in the E3D 2D
ah ¼ Eah kDIN ð4Þ
range Ka 6 Ky 6 K0, with K0 being the coefficient for earth pressure h  i
at rest usually assigned with K0 = 1  sin u0 . with kDIN ¼ 1  p2 1 þ A12 atanA  Aa .
Originally, Huder [15] derived the method for the case of a
smooth wall (da = 0). However, by using the earth pressure coeffi-
cient for da > 0, the method can also easily be applied to rough
walls.
Walz and Prager [31] extended the theory of element slices
developed by Terzaghi to three-dimensional cases. Here equilib-
rium considerations on horizontal slices of infinitesimal thickness
are formulated, and lateral shear stresses are considered to account
for the spatial conditions. Inside the failure wedge the vertical
effective stresses are calculated by means of the silo theory. Herein
– as in the Huder method [15] – an earth pressure coefficient Ky is
taken into account, which determines the magnitude of the shear
stress sw acting on the sides of the failure wedge (sw = rzKytan u0 ,
see Fig. 3). According to Walz and Prager [31], this coefficient can
be either Ky = K0 or Ky = cos2 u0 .
The horizontal active earth pressure eah in a depth z is obtained
by the following equation:

eah ðzÞ ¼ K h ðzÞrz ð3Þ

cot #a z
with K h ðzÞ ¼ tan da þcotð# 0 ð1 þ j  j hÞ.
a u Þ
By the ‘‘arching factor’’ j in the above equation, the resulting
distribution of earth pressures can be controlled. For j = 0 a con-
stant earth pressure coefficient Kh results, and for j > 0 a redistri-
bution of the stresses with larger stresses in the upper part of Fig. 5. Finite element mesh for aspect ratios 2 6 n 6 4.
86 F. tom Wörden, M. Achmus / Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90

Table 2 supported e.g. by the results of Clough and Duncan [3]. According
Initial void ratios and corresponding parameters. to DIN 4085 [4], the smallest required displacement applies to par-
Soil Initial void Relative Peak friction allel movement of a wall, whereas the largest displacement applies
ratio e0 density Dra angle u0 (°) to a head rotation mode.
Loose sand 0.72 0.23 33.2 The question whether these values have to be modified for 3D
Medium dense sand 0.63 0.55 38.6 earth pressure problems has not yet been investigated.
Dense sand 0.58 0.72 42.1
a
emin = 0.499, emax = 0.789.
3. Finite element modeling

In order to clarify the dependence of active earth pressure on

aspect ratio, wall deformation mode, wall displacement, wall
roughness and relative density of the sand, numerical analyses
were carried out by means of the finite element method. Rigid
walls under parallel movement, head and toe rotation were consid-
ered. The aspect ratio n = h/b was varied from n = 0.3 to n = 15.
Loose, medium dense and dense sand and wall friction angles
between d = 0 and d = u0 were investigated. The Abaqus program
system [1] was used to carry out the simulations.

3.1. Model features

Fig. 6. Comparison of experimentally and numerically obtained earth pressure
forces.
uh
A ¼
2b
Here u0 is the angle of internal friction to be taken in radian.
An exemplary comparison of the three presented methods in
terms of the reduction factor k is shown in Fig. 4. For the Huder
method, the earth pressure coefficient Ky = K0 was considered, for
the Walz and Prager method both Ky = K0 and Ky = cos2 u0 were ap-
plied, in both cases with j = 0.
Significant differences of the predicted 3D earth pressure forces
were obtained. The DIN 4085 method gives the most conservative
results. The Walz and Prager method gives much smaller earth
pressure forces, demonstrating that the question of which method
is more realistic should be investigated. For a smooth wall (da = 0°)
also the results of the DIN 4126 method valid for slurry-supported
trenches are given. There is fair agreement with the Walz and Prag-
er method for relatively small aspect ratios, but for large aspect ra-
tios DIN 4126 gives greater reduction factors.
Regarding the wall displacement necessary to reach the
minimum (active) earth pressure force, experience values for the
two-dimensional case are given in DIN 4085 [4]. These ‘‘peak dis-
placement’’ values are dependent on the relative density of the
sand and the wall deformation mode and are based mainly on
investigations by Weißenbach [33]. However, the values are also
An example of a finite element mesh is shown in Fig. 5. The
width b of the wall was set to b = 5 m. To cope with the extremely
different wall heights necessary to model aspect ratios between
n = 0.3 and n = 15, different geometric models were applied. The
model depths were chosen such that the failure wedge could freely
develop and had sufficient distance to the model boundary. Model
widths and heights were chosen such that the stress redistribu-
tions in the wall plane were not affected by the boundaries. In all
cases parametric studies ensured that the model size and the mesh
fineness were sufficient to give accurate results.
The model dimensions and the meshing shown in Fig. 5 were
used for aspect ratios between 2 and 4, i.e. for wall heights
h = 10–20 m.
The behavior of the sand soil was modeled with the hypoplastic
material law, see e.g. von Wolffersdorff [28], Gudehus [11], Herle
and Gudehus [14]. This material law describes well the non-linear
and non-elastic behavior of granular soils, also taking dilatancy
and/or contractancy as well as stress- and path-dependent stiff-
ness of the soil into account.
In the hypoplastic formulation, the stress rate is dependent on
current stress state, deformation state and void ratio. For mono-
tonic loading, the material behavior is defined by eight parameters
and the initial void ratio. The parameters used in this study are gi-
ven in Table 1. These parameters were derived by tom Wörden [26]
for a poorly graded medium to coarse sand used in model tests and
are used here both in the model validation and the parametric

Fig. 7. Comparison of experimentally and numerically obtained load–displacement relationships.

 F. tom Wörden, M. Achmus / Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90 87

Fig. 8. Load displacement relationships for parallel movement and head rotation dependent on aspect ratio.

Table 3 the latter, the coefficient for earth pressure at rest K0 was applied
Numerically obtained dimensionless peak displacement values. with K0 = 1  sin u0 for NC sand. Then the wall deflection was sim-
Relative density uP/h in %(Bandwidth for 0.3 6 n 6 15) ulated with deformation control. The resultant horizontal earth
pressure force at a certain deformation stage was calculated by
Parallel movement Head rotation Toe rotation
numerical integration of the interface stresses r0N over the surface
Dr = 0.23 (loose) 0.15–0.40 0.20–0.50 (1.20–1.80) area of the wall.
Dr = 0.55 (med. dense) 0.10–0.40 0.20–0.80 (1.00–1.85)
Dr = 0.72 (dense) 0.10–0.30 0.30–0.80 (0.70–1.60)
3.2. Model validation

Model tests were carried out in a test box with dimensions of

study. Regarding the physical significance of these parameters, ref-
1.20 m  0.805 m  1.70 m [26]. First, the sand was poured into
erence is made here to Herle and Gudehus [14].
the test box, reaching the required initial void ratio by using spe-
In hypoplasticity the stress dependency of the angle of internal
cially calibrated settings in the pouring process. Then the wall, con-
friction (barotropy) is taken into account. Thus, the peak friction
sisting of an almost rigid aluminum plate with a width of b = 0.2 m
angle u0 is not an input parameter, but results indirectly from
and heights between h = 0.4 m and 1.6 m (i.e. n = 2–8), was moved
the material law, the stress conditions and the initial void ratio as-
away from the soil body in parallel movement or in head or toe
signed. Three initial void ratios were applied. These void ratios, the
rotation mode. The tests were carried out with displacement con-
respective relative densities and the peak friction angles which re-
trol, and the resultant force acting on the aluminum plate was
sult from the back-calculation of triaxial tests with confining stres-
measured by two load cells located at the top and the bottom of
ses between 100 and 400 kPa are given in Table 2. It should be
the plate.
noted that the void ratio used as state parameter in the hypoplastic
The test results were used for the validation of the numerical
material law affects the whole stress–strain behavior, i.e. both stiff-
model. The hypoplastic material parameters given in Table 1 were
ness and strength of the soil. Thus, increasing the initial void ratio
derived for the sand used in the tests. In Fig. 6, the measured and
leads both to lower shear strength and lower stiffness of the soil.
the numerically obtained resultant earth pressure forces are de-
The wall was modeled as a rigid surface, to which the deforma-
picted for medium dense sand. A good agreement of the numerical
tions desired for the different deformation modes could be as-
and experimental results can be stated for the case of parallel
signed. The contact behavior between soil and wall was modeled
movement. For the other deformation modes, quantitative agree-
in Abaqus by defining contact pairs in which the Coulomb friction
ment is not quite as good. However, the dependence of measured
law was used as a contact law. Thus, for the maximum shear stress
and predicted forces on the aspect ratio is in all cases very similar.
smax acting on the wall surface the following equation applies:
In particular, both results show that the active earth pressure un-
der parallel movement is smaller than for head or toe rotation of
smax ¼ r0N tan da ð5Þ
the wall.
Here r0N is the effective stress acting perpendicular to the wall In Fig. 7 load–displacement relationships for an aspect ratio
surface and da is the wall friction angle. n = 4 are compared. There is evidently no perfect agreement be-
For a calculation, first the initial void ratio and an initial hori- tween experimental and numerical results. This might be induced
zontal stress state had to be assigned to the soil elements. For by unavoidable inaccurateness in the experiments and also by defi-

Fig. 9. Normalized earth pressure forces for different deformation modes for b = 5 m.
88 F. tom Wörden, M. Achmus / Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90
Fig. 10. Numerically obtained reduction factors k (head rotation).
ciencies of the numerical model. In particular, the continuum ap-
proach applied here has its limitations in the prediction of post-
peak behavior. Shear localization phenomena may lead to mesh-
dependent calculation results. Regularization methods which can
overcome such problems were not employed here. This might ex-
plain the deviations at large wall displacements. However, general
trends are well reproduced by the numerical model. For instance,
the variation in peak displacement for the different deformation
modes is reproduced fairly well. Thus, a comparison with model
test results shows that the numerical model is well suited to inves-
tigate the magnitude and deformation-dependency of 3D active
earth pressure forces on walls in sand.
3.3. Results
The presented finite element model was used to carry out a
comprehensive parametric study. In the following, results are pre-
sented with regard to peak displacement values and resultant ac-
tive earth pressure forces.
3.3.1. Load–displacement curves
Fig. 8 shows load–displacement relationships calculated for
medium dense sand and a rough wall (da = 2/3u0 ). Evidently, the
dimensionless peak displacement uP/h, at which the active limit
state (minimum earth pressure) is reached becomes smaller, the
larger the aspect ratio is. However, it should be noted that if n be-
comes larger, h also becomes larger. Thus, the absolute value of uP
of course increases with increasing wall height.
The calculated dimensionless peak displacements are presented
in Table 3 dependent on the wall deformation mode and the rela-
tive density of the sand. Regarding the deformation mode, the
smallest values apply to parallel movement of the wall, which
agrees with findings for the two-dimensional case [33]. Regarding
relative density, tendentially the greater the relative density is, the
smaller the peak displacement, as was to be expected. However, at
least for parallel movement and also for head rotation the differ-
ences are rather small. The values for toe rotation in Table 3 are
set in brackets, since a clear peak could hardly be found in many
cases (see also Fig. 7). Relatively large displacements are necessary
to mobilize the active limit state within the entire shear zone with
toe rotation of the wall. This is in agreement with the findings of
Potts and Fourie [24] and Hettler and Abdel-Rahman [13].
3.3.2. Effect of the deformation mode
Fig. 9 shows, for a smooth wall with a width of b = 5 m, the cal-
culated earth pressures in a normalized form (reduction factor k)
dependent on the aspect ratio. It is evident that the most unfavour-
able deformation mode is the head rotation, since here the largest
earth pressure forces occur. Similar values apply for toe rotation,
but significantly smaller values apply for parallel movement. For
loose sand the active earth pressure force is 20–30% smaller than
for head rotation. For dense sand the difference is even larger, with
Fig. 11. Reduction factors k for different wall friction angles (loose sand, head
rotation).
the active earth pressure force for parallel movement being only
50–60% of the value for head rotation. Similar results were ob-
tained for the two-dimensional case from Hettler and Abdel-Rah-
man [13].
3.3.3. Effect of aspect ratio and relative density on the reduction factor
k
For a smooth wall (da = 0), the numerically obtained reduction
factors k giving the relation of the resultant earth pressure force
to the two-dimensional earth pressure force are shown in Fig. 10.
Here only the values for head rotation are given, since these are
the most unfavourable and conservative values which should usu-
ally be applied in practice.
Fig. 10 shows clearly that the reduction factor is mainly depen-
dent on the aspect ratio n. The largest decrease in the factor k oc-
curs for aspect ratios of up to n = 5. However, even for n > 5 a
further decrease of the reduction factor is obtained.
The effect of the relative density on the reduction factor is of
minor importance. However, there is a clear trend that smaller fac-
tors apply for dense sand than for loose sand.
Disregarding the minor effect of relative density, the average k-
values can be determined by the following equation (see also
Fig. 10):
k  1  0:88ð1  0:7n Þ ð6Þ
3.3.4. Effect of wall roughness
As in the two-dimensional case, the wall roughness in terms of
the wall friction angle of course affects the magnitude of the active
earth pressure. For a smooth wall the active earth pressure is great-
er than for a rough wall. However, with respect to the reduction
factor k, almost no differences were found in the numerical simu-
lations for wall friction angles varying between da = 0 and da = u0 .
This is shown in Fig. 11 for the exemplary case of loose sand
(Dr = 0.23). Obviously the effect of wall roughness is fully covered
by the differences of the earth pressure coefficients for the two-
dimensional case and remains the same independent of the aspect
ratio.
4. Comparison with existing calculation approaches
Fig. 12 shows a comparison of the numerical simulation results
for the most unfavourable case of head rotation with the existing
calculation approaches presented in Section 2. For the Walz and
Prager method [31], the arching factor j = 0 was used and only
the results for the case Ky = K0 are given, which gives larger k-val-
ues than Ky = cos2 u0 . For the smooth wall case (da = 0), the results
of the DIN 4126 method [5] used in Germany for the design of slur-
ry-supported trenches are also shown.
In all cases both the Huder method [15] and the DIN 4085 meth-
od [4] give very conservative k-values, i.e. relatively large 3D active
 F. tom Wörden, M. Achmus / Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90
Fig. 12. Comparison of finite element results with calculation approaches.
earth pressure forces. The DIN 4126 method [5] yields better
agreement with the numerical results. For large aspect ratios the
method is conservative, but for small n-values (n 6 3) too small
values can also be obtained.
The best agreement with the numerical simulation results is ob-
tained with the Walz and Prager method [31] based on the theory
of element slices. The method gives almost identical or slightly
greater (conservative) values. Thus, based on the results of this
study, the use of the Walz and Prager method with Ky = K0 and
j = 0 can be recommended for the calculation of 3D active earth
pressure forces on rigid walls.
5. Conclusions
3D active earth pressure forces on walls in homogeneous nor-
mally consolidated sand were investigated. For the considered the-
oretical case of rigid wall deformation modes parallel movement,
head rotation and toe rotation the following conclusions can be
drawn from the numerical simulations:
 The wall deformation necessary to fully mobilize the soil’s shear
strength and thus to reach the active limit state decreases with
the aspect ratio. This means that using peak displacements valid
for two-dimensional cases is on the safe side. The smallest peak
displacement values apply for parallel movement and the larg-
est for toe rotation, which is in agreement with findings for
two-dimensional earth pressure cases.
89
 Regarding the magnitude of the resultant earth pressure force,
the head rotation is the most unfavourable wall deformation
mode, i.e. gives the largest resultant force.
 If the reduction factor k is considered, which relates the 3D
active earth pressure force to the two-dimensional earth pres-
sure force, the effect of the wall friction angle is negligible.
The effect of wall roughness is fully covered by the differences
of the earth pressure coefficients for the two-dimensional case.
 The reduction factor k is mainly dependent on the aspect ratio n.
A new equation derived from the numerical simulation results
is proposed to account for this. A dependence on the relative
density of the sand was also obtained, but the effect is only
marginal.
 From the existing analytical calculation approaches the Walz
and Prager method [31] corresponds best with the numerically
obtained results. Other methods and in particular the methods
described in the German standards DIN 4126 [5] and DIN 4085
[4] give significantly larger earth pressure forces in most cases.
Of course, more numerical and experimental investigations are
necessary to confirm the results obtained in this study. It should
also be noted that the consideration of a rigid wall and the related
wall deformation modes is a strong idealization. In particular at
retaining walls the motion of the lateral edges of the wall may
be prevented by structural elements. Therefore, the effects of wall
flexibility and displacement constraints must be further investi-
gated to derive sound practical recommendations. However, it
90 F. tom Wörden, M. Achmus / Computers and Geotechnics 51 (2013) 83–90
can be stated that regarding 3D active earth pressure problems
practical design seems in most cases very conservative, leaving
space for optimization.
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