Plastic flow rule for sands with friction, dilation, density and stress state coupling

Abstract In this paper we propose a flow rule and failure criterion for sands in plane strain conditions based on Drucker-Prager formulation and enhanced with empirical Houlsby formula, which couples friction, dilation, density and stress state in the material. The resulting elasto-plastic, non-associated, shear hardening material model is implemented as a numerical procedure in the frame of finite element method and a simple compression example is presented. Because of the empirical nature of Houlsby formula, it is believed that results of numerical simulations will be more realistic both in deformation and shear strength estimation of sands.