Geotechnical causes for variations in output measured from shallow buried charges

•Repeatability of output from charges buried in 6 different soil types are given.•Methods for preparing repeatable soil beds are described.•Specific soils are shown to have higher repeatability than tests using a Minepot.•Guidance is given for soil choice for future testing with buried charges.

The role of the geotechnical conditions on the impulse delivered by a shallow buried charge has received much attention in recent times. As the importance of the soil in these events has become better understood, the control over the geotechnical conditions has improved. While previous work has investigated directly the role of geotechnical conditions on the magnitude of the impulse from a buried charge, the current work aims to identify how these same conditions also affect the repeatability of testing using soils. In this paper the authors draw together their work to date for a wide range of different soil types and moisture contents to investigate the variation in output from nominally identical tests. The methodology for the preparation of soil beds and the measurement of impulse is described along with the measured variations in peak and residual deflections of a target plate fixed to the impulse measurement apparatus.

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