Investigation of shear behavior between geopolymer mortar samples produced by considering different variables and sand soil

This thesis was designed to investigate the effects of various production parameters on the sliding behavior at the interface between geopolymer mortar (GPM) and sand soil. Initially, the effects of different NaOH concentrations (5, 10 and 15M), aggregate types (stream aggregates, crushed stone aggregates and construction and demolition waste aggregates) and alkali/binder ratios (0.5 and 0.6) on granulated blast furnace slag (BFS) based geopolymer mortar samples were investigated. For this purpose, compressive strength, ultrasonic pulse velocity (UPV) and water absorption tests were completed on 28-day geopolymer mortar samples. Maximum compressive strength values and lowest permeability properties were obtained from samples activated with 15M NaOH, produced using crushed stone and cured in water, with an alkali/binder ratio of 0.5. Then, the shear behavior between geopolymer mortar and sand soil was determined using the shear box test. According to the results of these tests, it was observed that the use of CDW and increasing the alkali/binder ratio decreased the internal friction angle. In addition, the soil-concrete interaction was determined using the finite element method (FEM) in ABAQUS. Numerical modeling was used to analyze the force-displacement trends. The numerical results showed good agreement with the experimental data.