SEEPAGE

• The continuous movement of water from the upstream face of the dam towards its
downstream face.
• The process by which a liquid leak through a porous substance.
• Water that seeped or oozed through a porous soil.

Facts about Seepage

• Wet areas downstream from dams are not usually natural springs, but seepage through or
under the dam. Even if natural springs exist, they should be treated with suspicion and
carefully observed.
• All dams have some seepage as the impounded seeks paths of the least resistance through
the dam and its foundation.
• Seepage becomes a concern if it is carrying material with it, and should controlled to
prevent erosion of the embankment, or foundation, or damage to concrete structures.
Types of Dams
1. Homogeneous dam

• Is one that is composed almost entirely of the one material which is usually relatively
impervious.
• With this type of dam, it is necessary to incorporate some type of downstream
pervious drain with appropriately placed filters in order to control the seepage water.
This is to prevent the occurrence of a “piping” failure by the internal erosion of the
finer particles of the earth fill.

PIPING
-Internal erosion of the foundation or embankment caused by seepage.

Resistance of the embankment or foundation to piping depends on:

 1) Plasticity of the soil
2) The gradation
3) The degree of compactness

2. Thin core dam

 If there exists a plentiful supply of rockfill, a thin core dam could be constructed. The
rockfill could be rolled by means of compaction equipment or dumped from trucks.
 Impervious cores having widths of 15% to 20% of the water head usually perform
satisfactorily if adequately designed and constructed filter layers are incorporated.

3. Zoned earth and rockfill dam

 When a wide range of construction materials is available within the vicinity of the
dam site, a zoned earth and rockfill dam incorporating all of these materials.
 The term “rockfill dam” is usually restricted to a dam composed almost entirely of
rockfill.
 The water barrier may consist of an upstream membrane of metal, concrete, asphalt or
earth fill or there may be no water barrier at all.
CAUSES OF SEEPAGE
1. Poor Compaction of Environment Soil
2. Shrinkage Cracking in the Environment Soil
3. Earthquakes
4. Insufficient Structural Drainage
5. Trapped Groundwater

EFFECTS OF SEEPAGE
1. Pipping
2. Internal Erosion
3. Solutioning of Soluble Rocks
4. Excessive Internal Pressures and/or Saturation
5. Excessive Uplift Heave or Blowout

SAFETY PRECAUTIONS REGARDING SEEPAGE

DETECTION
• Seepage can emerge anywhere on the downstream face, beyond the toe, or on the
downstream abutments at elevations below normal pool.
• Seepage may vary in appearance from a "soft" wet area to a flowing "spring." It may
show up first as an area where the vegetation is lush and darker green.
• Seepage flow which is muddy and carrying sediment (soil particles) is evidence of
"piping," and is a serious condition that if left untreated can cause failure of the dam.
• A continuous or sudden drop in the normal lake level is another indication that seepage is
occurring.
CONTROL
• The need for seepage control will depend on the quantity, content, and location of the
seepage.
 Typical methods used to control the quantity of seepage
 Grouting or installation of an upstream blanket
-This method is probably the least effective and is most applicable to leakage
zones in bedrock, abutments, and foundations.

 Controlling the content of the seepage or preventing seepage flow from removing soil
particles is extremely important.
 The owner must retain a professional engineer to design toe drains, relief wells, inverted
filters, weep holes, or relief holes, and regular monitoring of these features is critical.
 Weep holes and relief drains can be installed to relieve water pressure or drain seepage
from behind or beneath concrete structures.

MONITORING
 Regular monitoring is essential to detect seepage and prevent dam failure.
 Knowledge of the dam's history is important to determine whether the seepage condition
is in a steady or changing state.
 It is important to keep written records of points of seepage exit, quantity and content of
flow, size of wet area, and type of vegetation for later comparison.

 All records should be kept with the Inspection and Maintenance Plan for the dam.
 Instrumentation can also be used to monitor seepage.
 V-notch weirs can be used to measure flow rates easily and inexpensively.
 Piezometers may be used to determine the saturation level (phreatic surface)
within the embankment.
 Regular surveillance and maintenance of the internal embankment and foundation
drainage outlets is also required.
 The rate and content of flow from each pipe outlet for toe drains, relief wells, weep holes,
and relief drains should be monitored and documented regularly.
 Typical obstructions include debris, gravel, sediment, mineral deposits, calcification of
concrete, and rodent nests.
FLOW NETS
• Seepage losses through the ground or through earth dams and leeves and the related flow
pattern and rate of energy loss, or dissipation of hydrostatic head, are frequently
estimated by means of a graphical technique known as flow net.
• Flow net is a graphical representation of a flow field that satisfies Laplace’s equation and
comprises a family of flow lines and equipotential lines.

A flow net must meet the following criteria:

1. The boundary conditions must be satisfied.
2. Flow lines must intersect equipotential lines at right angles.
3. The area between flow lines and equipotential lines must be curvilinear squares. A
curvilinear square has the property that an inscribed circle can drawn to touch each side
of the square and continuous bisection results, in the limit, in a point.
4. The quantity of flow through each flow channel is constant.
5. The head loss between each consecutive equipotential line is constant.
6. A flow line cannot intersect another flow line.
7. An equipotential line cannot intersect another equipotential line.
8. Flow line is the path followed by a particle of water as it moves through a saturated soil
mass.
9. Equipotential line is a line connecting points of equal potential energy.
The flow of water through isotropic soil is:
N
q= kHN𝑓
𝑑

where:
k= coefficient of permeability
H= head
N𝑓 = number of flow channel= number of flow lines minus one

N𝑑 = number of equipotential (pressure) drops

 = number of equipotential lines minus one
N𝑓
is called the shape factor
N𝑑

If the soil is anisotropic:

N
q= HN𝑓 √k1 k 2
𝑑

Problem 1:
• The section of a sheet pile is shown. The coefficient of
permeability of the soil is k= 4.2 x10−3 m/s. determine
the seepage into the downstream side per meter length of
the sheet pile.
Solution:
𝑁
[q=kH𝑁𝑓 ]
𝑑

k = 4.2 × 10−3 𝑚⁄𝑠

𝑁𝑓 = 4

𝑁𝑑 = 8
𝐻 =7−2=5𝑚
4
𝑞 = 4.2 × 10−3 𝑚⁄𝑠 (5) 8

𝑞 = 0.0105 𝑚3 ⁄𝑠 per meter

𝑞 = 10.5 𝑳⁄𝒔
Problem 2:
• For the masonry dam shown, k= 5 m/day.
a) Determine the seepage flow per meter width of dam in
liters per minute.
b) Determine the uplift pressure at A and B in KPa.
c) Determine the uplift force per meter of dam. Assume that
the uplift pressure under the dam varies uniformly.
Solution:

a.) Flow per unit width:

number of flow channels, 𝑁𝑓 = 4

number of presseure drops, 𝑁𝑑 = 9

𝑁
Seepage flow, q = kH𝑁𝑓
𝑑

4
seepage flow, q = 5(18)9

seepage flow, q = 40 𝑚3 ⁄𝑑𝑎𝑦

1 1 𝑳
40 × 24 × 60 × 1000 = 27.78 𝒎𝒊𝒏

Solution cont’d:

b.) PRESSURE AT A AND B:

𝐻
pressure head drop =𝑁
𝑑

18
pressure head drop = 9

pressure head drop = 2 m per drop

pressure head, h1 = 18-2(1) = 16 m
pressure head drop, h2 = 18-2(8) = 2 m
 𝑃𝐴 = 𝑦𝑤 ℎ𝑔 = 9.81(16)

𝑃𝐴 = 𝟏𝟓𝟔. 𝟗𝟔 𝐤𝐏𝐚
𝑃𝐵 = 𝑦𝑤 ℎ𝑔 = 9.81(2)

𝑷𝑩 = 𝟏𝟗. 𝟔𝟐 𝒌𝑷𝒂

c.) UPLIFT PRESSURE PER UNIT LENGH OF

DAM:
𝑃𝐴 +𝑃𝐵
𝑈= (30) × 1
2
156.96+19.62
U= (30) × 1
2

U = 𝟐, 𝟔𝟔𝟒𝟖. 𝟕 𝒌𝑵

A. FILTER
 An engineered material that is designed to retain the base soils as well as have a
significantly higher permeability than the base soils being protected.
 Commonly constructed of sand materials.

B. PURPOSE
1. Prevent soil erosion
2. Slope stability
3. Dissipates pore pressure

C. LOCATIONS
1. Toe – a zone of material limited to the downstream toe of dam. Commonly
constructed of rock fill.
2. Blanket – a zone of material located under the downstream shell of the dam at or
near the foundation contact. As the name implies, it typically ‘blankets’ the ground
surface upon which it is placed.
3. Chimney – a zone of material located internal to the dam that is commonly vertical,
thus the name. a non-vertical chimney is commonly described as inclined. A
chimney may or may not connect to a blanket.
 D. IMPORTANCE
 Although the design of filter materials and their application to soil structures is
taught in undergraduate classes and is well known to geotechnical engineers, the
lack of the design and placement of filter materials still causes numerous failures.
Hence, further efforts on the selection of appropriate filter materials and their
incorporation in soil structures are essential.

E. HISTORY
During Terzaghi’s time:
1. 1919 – 1921 - the idea of using filter and drains is conceived.
2. 1922 - published the concept of weighted filter.
3. 1939 - published the criteria for filter design.

Terzaghi’s filter criteria quickly became recognized and validated through further testing
and were formally published in the early soil mechanics text books.

F. DESIGN OF FILTER MATERIALS

1. Filter Ability - The filter design was reconsidered after incidents at and failures of
major dam structures. After the Balderhead dam incident, where core material was
eroded from an open fracture in the core zone into the filter material so causing
sinkholes at the dam crest, Peter Vaughan and his coworkers searched for what they
called the “perfect filter”. The idea was to hold back the smallest grain of a core
material even under severe conditions such as concentrated seepage flow at high
hydraulic gradients through a crack in the core. The approach towards the criterion
was not via the gradation curve, such as adopted before by Terzaghi and his co-
workers, but by the permeability coefficient of the filter material.
2. Internal Stability - For filter materials to be internally stable means that within the
soil skeleton the small particles do not move due to water flow forces. All soil
particles should remain at their position even for water flow at high (>>1) hydraulic
gradients such as occur at a fracture in the sealing zone of an embankment. A good
definition of internal stability is given: “Internal stability of granular material
results from its ability to prevent loss of its own small particles due to disturbing
forces such as seepage and vibration.”
3. Self-Healing - Self-healing means that cracks which can form in the filter zone due
to differential settlement. do not stay open but close in case of water flow. Hence,
the filter material must not have cohesion.
4. Material Segregation - When the filter material segregates, meaning that the
coarser particles separate from the finer particles, the filter zone can no longer fulfill
its purpose of preventing fine particles moving from the core to the filter zone or
within the filter zone, because the segregated coarse grained components do not
 form a filter to the adjacent materials. Hence, the segregation of filter materials has
to be avoided. Whether a material segregates depends on the handling and
placement methods and on the gradation of the
material.
5. Drainage Capacity - The Terzaghi criterion D15f/d85b ≥ 4 still applies and
Sherard recommends D15f≥ 0.2 mm.
Material Durability - The durability of filter materials is typically investigated with standard
tests such as the Los Angeles abrasion test (ASTM C535) or the wet and dry strength variation
(typical limit ≤35%).
NATURAL OR ARTIFICIAL SLOPES MAY BE:
1. INFINITE SLOPES
- THE TERM INFINITE SLOPE IS USED TO DESIGNATE A CONSTANT SLOPE
OF INFINITE EXTENT
- THE LONG SLOPE OF THE FACE OF A MOUNTAIN
2. FINITE SLOPES
- FINITE SLOPES ARE LIMITED IN EXTENT
- THE SLOPES OF EMBANKMENTS AND EARTH DAMS ARE EXAMPLE OF
FINITE SLOPES

SLOPE STABILITY:
- DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTIOM OF EARTH DAMS
- SLOPE FAILURE CAN OFTEN BE CATASTROPHOBIC, INVOLVING THE LOSS
OF CONSIDERABLE PROPERTY AND MANY LIVES.

CAUSES OF SLOPE FAILURE:

- GRAVITATIONAL FORCE
- FORCE DUE TO SEEPAGE WATER
- EROSION OF THE SURFACE OF SLOPES DUE TO FLOWING WATER
- SUDDEN LOWERING OF WATER ADJACENT TO A SLOPE
- FORCES DUE TO EARTHQUAKES

TWO TYPES OF SLOPES OF EARTH

1. Natural slopes

2. Man made slopes

SLOPE STABILITY
IN SLOPE STABILITY ANALYSIS WE DETERMINE THE FACTOR OF SAFETY AS A
RATIO OF RESISTING FORCES TO DRIVING FORCES
FS = RESISTING/DRIVING
THEORITICALLY, ANY SLOPE WITH FS = 1 WILL FAIL AND FS > 1 WILL NOT FAIL

THE SHEAR STRENGTH OF SOIL IS ASSUMED TO FOLLOW COULOMB’S LAW

FACTOR OF SAFETY
1. FACTOR OF SAFETY WITH RESPECT TO SHEARING STRENGTH
2. FACTOR OF SAFETY WITH RESPECT TO COHESION
3. FACTOR OF SAFETY WITH RESPECT TO HEIGHT

EFFECTS OF WATER ON SOIL STABILITY

 IMPORTANCE OF WATER
 Next to gravity, water is the most important factor in slope stability. Water is the key factor
in assessing slope stability
 EFFECTS OF WATER ON COHESIONLESS SOILS

In cohesionless soils, water does not affect the angle of internal friction. The effects of water
on cohesionless soils below nthe water table is to decrease the intergranular (effective) stress
between soil grains, which decreases the frictional shearing resistance.
TYPES OF SLOPE FAILURE
1. PLANE FAILURE
A rock slope undergoes this mode of failure when combinations of discontinuities in the
rock mas frorm blocks or wedges within the rock which are free to move.
2. WEDGE FAILURE
This failure can occur in rock mass with two or more sets of discontinuities whos lines of
intersection are approximately perpendicular to the strike of the slope.
3. TOPPLING FAILURE
This failure occurs when columns of rock, formed by steeply dipping discontinuities in
the rock rotates about an essentially fixed point at or near the base of the slope .
4. ROTATIONAL FAILURE
Transnational and compound slips occure where the form of the failure surface is
influenced by the presence of an adjacent stratum of significantly different strength.