Active and Passive Pressure
The active state occurs when a soil mass is allowed to relax or move outward to the point of reaching the limiting strength of the soil; that is, the soil is at the failure condition in extension. Thus it is the minimum lateral soil pressure that may be exerted. Conversely, the passive state occurs when a soil mass is externally forced to the limiting strength (that is, failure) of the soil in compression. It is the maximum lateral soil pressure that may be exerted. Thus active and passive pressures define the minimum and maximum possible pressures respectively that may be exerted in a horizontal plane.
Read more about this topic: Lateral Earth Pressure
Famous quotes containing the words active and, active, passive and/or pressure:
“Why indeed must “God” be a noun? Why not a verb—the most active and dynamic of all.”
—Mary Daly (b. 1928)
“This teaching is not practical in the sense in which the New Testament is. It is not always sound sense in practice. The Brahman never proposes courageously to assault evil, but patiently to starve it out. His active faculties are paralyzed by the idea of caste, of impassable limits of destiny and the tyranny of time.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“To make oneself an object, to make oneself passive, is a very different thing from being a passive object.”
—Simone De Beauvoir (1908–1986)
“I am convinced that our American society will become more and more vulgarized and that it will be fragmentized into contending economic, racial and religious pressure groups lacking in unity and common will, unless we can arrest the disintegration of the family and of community solidarity.”
—Agnes E. Meyer (1887–1970)