Abstract: Large deformation of soil will occur when the structure moves through the soil, which is more appropriate to be analyzed by large deformation finite element method. Coupled Eulerian-Lagrangian (CEL) method is one of the most suitable method of the large deformation finite element methods. In China, there is no research on the ultimate capacity of plate anchors using the CEL method. Two pull-out model tests including square anchors in uniform and linear clay are taken as prototypes to build numerical models with the CEL method. Comparative studies are conducted between the model tests and numerical models on the ultimate capacity of plate anchors and the failure mechanism of soil. With a user-defined subroutine, the linear shear strength of soil can be updated with the mobilization of the anchor. The results show that the ultimate capacity of the anchor increases with the Young’s modulus, when the pullout force of the anchor increases with the displacement to a peak value at the beginning and followed by a decrease. If the embedment ratio is lower than the critical value, general failure mechanism can be observed. Contrarily, localized failure mechanism will develop. The numerical results agree well with model tests, demonstrating that the CEL method can well simulate the complete response of the anchor of large mobilization.

Key words: CEL method, large deformation, plate anchor, ultimate bearing capacity, clay