Abstract: Reinforced soil retaining wall has been widely used in various projects because of its excellent mechanical properties, lower costs and better terrain adaptability. However, its real mechanism under working stress condition is not completely clear and current design guidelines could not reflect the real stress distribution in reinforced retaining wall. In order to research the behavior of reinforced retaining wall with different reinforcement stiffness, we monitor geogrid strain, horizontal displacement of facing, and earth pressure by geotechnical centrifuge tests. Results indicate that the deformation of reinforcement is more significant when using reinforcement of small stiffness,while the distribution of vertical earth pressure along the potential sliding surface is barely affected by stiffness. In both models, earth pressure adjoining to facing panel is much lower than theoretical value, and the maximum strain of geogrid appears in the mid-lower part of wall. Traditional earth pressure theory could not simply explain the reinforcement strain at panel connections. We should also take into account the pulling effect between panel and reinforced soil induced by differential settlement of backfill and other factors. The tests results offer reference for researching the behavior of reinforced soil retaining wall and the mechanism of interaction between soil and reinforcement under working stress conditions.

Key words: reinforced soil retaining wall, geotechnical centrifugal test, stiffness of reinforcement, strain of geogrid, earth pressure