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Development and Application of TDR Mini-Probes for Monitoring Moisture in Small-Scale Laboratory Tests

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Abstract

The time domain reflectometry (TDR) method has been widely used to explore and track soil moisture. It is necessary to research mini-probes for reducing the influence of the transducer on soil measurement, which encountered many challenges, especially as the transducers are used for studying small-scaled laboratory tests of stiff clay. To overcome these problems, three-wire mini-probes were developed and applied in the present work. Initially, a two-dimensional (2D) weighting theory and numerical simulations were adopted to preliminarily determine the rod spacing (4–4.5 mm) and diameter (0.47–0.63 mm). Subsequently, needle and drill mini-probes were designed to conduct experimental calibration. It was reasonable to employ a 3 cm probe for measurement and a linear equation that related Ka1/2 with θ was obtained. Finally, mini-probes were applied to measure water content of compacted and intact stiff clay specimens during continuous desiccation and intact Téguline clay column during wetting, indicating that the mini-probes have the acceptable workability for measuring the moisture of compacted/intact stiff clay undergoing desiccation or wetting processes.

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Acknowledgements

The research described in this paper was financially supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 41907239, 42177138 and 51878159) and the Project funded by China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2020M680909) and the European Commission of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions HERCULES—Towards Geo-Hazards Resilient Infrastructure under Changing Climates (H2020-MSCA-RISE-2017, 778360).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Civil Engineering, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, 030024, People’s Republic of China

    Pengju Qin

  2. Shanxi Transportation Technology Research and Development Co. Ltd., Taiyuan, 030032, China

    Pengju Qin

  3. Ecole des Ponts ParisTech, UR Navier/CERMES, 6-8, av. Blaise Pascal, Cité Descartes, 77455, Marne-la-Vallée, France

    Yujun Cui

  4. Department of Geotechnical Engineering, College of Civil Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai, 200092, People’s Republic of China

    Weimin Ye

  5. School of Transportation, Southeast University, SEU Avenue 2#, Jiangning District, 211189, Nanjing, People’s Republic of China

    Yongfeng Deng

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Correspondence to Yongfeng Deng.

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Qin, P., Deng, Y., Cui, Y. et al. Development and Application of TDR Mini-Probes for Monitoring Moisture in Small-Scale Laboratory Tests. Int J Civ Eng 21, 905–914 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40999-022-00772-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40999-022-00772-7

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