Geomechanics and Engineering

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A novel viewpoint on producing geogrids: 3D-printed geogrids

  • Bahadir Ok (Department of Civil Engineering, Adana Alparslan Turkes Science and Technology University) ;
  • Bestami Mirac Sert (Department of Civil Engineering, Adana Alparslan Turkes Science and Technology University) ;
  • Mirsadegh Seyedzavvar (Department of Mechanical Engineering, Adana Alparslan Turkes Science and Technology University) ;
  • Cem Boga (Department of Mechanical Engineering, Adana Alparslan Turkes Science and Technology University) ;
  • Kadir Aydin (Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ostim Technical University)
  • Received : 2023.09.14
  • Accepted : 2026.01.26
  • Published : 2026.02.10
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Abstract

The production of geogrids for use in geotechnical engineering applications could benefit from 3D printers providing the opportunity for rapid design development and application of economical, easily accessible, and environmentally friendly raw materials. This study looks at how the design parameters, like aperture shape, rib thickness, and rib width, affect the tensile strength and strain behavior of geogrids designed with open-access software and printed with a large-scale 3D printer working based on fused deposition modeling techniques. Besides, a comparison of the performance of 3D-printed and factory-made geogrids has also been conducted on triaxial geogrids. The tensile strength and thermo-mechanical properties of geogrid samples have been characterized using uniaxial tensile tests and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) analysis. The results revealed that the tensile strength and tensile moduli of geogrids increase with increasing junction thickness, rib thickness, and rib width. Findings also showed that the single rib of geogrids with biaxial (BX) architecture had a larger cross-section than that in triaxial (TX) grid structure by about 40% to satisfy the same mass of fabricated geogrids, and resultantly, the maximum load capacity of BX-grids overpass that of TX-grids by about 6%. However, the TX-grids showed better performance for unit strain at failure by over 6% as compared with BX-grids. Therefore, the experiments and analysis have been mainly focused on the 3D-TX grids, their stress and strain analyses at different rib thickness, the correlation with thermal properties of fabricated specimens and a comparison between the performance metrics between the 3D-printed and counterpart factory-made geogrids.

Keywords

References

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