Darstellung von Wasserdrücken im Boden mit strömendem Grundwasser

Representation of water pressures in the soil with flowing ground water.

Based on a groundwater flow net consisting of flow lines and equipotential lines, the relations between the pore water pressure forces acting on a volume element of the soil and the deduced uplift and seepage forces after Terzaghi are depicted for different cases. The seepage force turns out to be the force that has to be added as a vector in the flow direction to the uplift force acting in case of stagnant groundwater to obtain the resultant water pressure force in case of flowing groundwater. It is depicted how the effective resultant volume force of a soil body, which is determinant for the effective stresses, arises by the two statically equivalent concepts. As an example, the conditions of seepage failure are considered.