ABSTRACT
Geotechnical engineers often encounter problems in designing foundations of structures on highly compressible clayey soil due to its poor bearing capacity, low shearing strength, etc. Soil reinforcement is an effective and reliable technique for improving strength and stability of soils. Several studies have been conducted to investigate the influence of randomly oriented discrete inclusions (fibres, mesh elements, waste material e.g. plastic strips, tire chips, etc.) on the highly compressible clayey soils. Most of these studies were conducted on small size samples in triaxial, C.B.R., unconfined compression and direct shear tests. So in the present study a series of small scale test i.e. triaxial tests and consolidation tests and large samples tests i.e. laboratory model tests on square footings supported on highly compressible clayey soil reinforced with randomly distributed polyester fibre were conducted in order to compare the results with those obtained from unreinforced soil and with each other. In this study amount of 12 mm polyester fibres mixed with highly compressible clayey soil varies from 0 to 1 %. The results of load settlement curve of different sizes of square footing reinforced with various amount of fibres and for various depths of fibres were recorded. The bearing capacity is also calculated in term of bearing capacity ratio. The results of model footing tests were checked by theoretical bearing capacity also. The results indicated that reinforcement of highly compressible clayey soil with randomly distributed fibres caused an increase in the ultimate bearing capacity and decrease in settlement at the ultimate load.
KEYWORDS:
settlement
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INTRODUCTION
With urbanization and mordernization at its peak, less amount of land is available for construction. Everywhere land is being utilized for various structures from an ordinary house to sky scrappers, from bridges to airports. Owing to this, construction of structures these days, is being carried on land having weak or soft soil. Now, stability of any structure depends on the properties of soil. Using land having soft soil for construction leads to various ground improvement techniques such as soil stabilization and reinforcement. Most of the soil available are such that they have good compressive strength adequate shear strength but weak in tension/ poor tensile strength. To overcome the same, many researchers have concentrated their studies on the development of new such materials, through the elaboration of composites. In the case of geotechnical engineering the idea of inserting fibrous materials in a soil mass in order to improve its mechnical behaviour has become very popular. The concept of earth reinforcement is an ancient technique and demonstrated abundanty in nature by animals, birds and the action of tree roots. These reinforcement resists tensile stress developed within the soil mass thereby restricting shear failure. Reinforcement intracts with the soil through friction and adhesion. The practicing engineers are employing this technique for stabilization of thin soil layers, reparing failed slopes, soil strengthing around the footings and earth retaining structures. The enclusion of randomly distributed discrete fiber increases strength parameters of the soil as in case of reinforced concrete construction. Foundation is a part of structure which transmits load of super structure to the sub soil. Geotechnical engineers face various problems while designing the foundations on highly compressible clayey soil due to poor bearing capacity and excessive settelment. Thus bearing capacity is one of the important ascpect of soil engineering. The majority of currently published literature about randomly oriented fiber reinforcement deals with the reinforcement of cohessionless or granular soils. Most of these studies were conducted on small size samples in C.B.R., unconfined compression, triaxial and direct shear tests (Andersland and Khattak, 1979: Hoare 1979: Gray and Ohashi, 1983; Maher and Gray,1990; Charan, 1985; Michalowski and Zhao, 1960; Michalowski and Cermak, 2003; Kaniraj and Havangi, 2001; Kaniraj and Gayatri, 2003; Gosavi et al., 2004, Yetimoglu et al., 2005). Very few studies have been reported on large sample under model footing test on cohesionless soils (Gupta, 2008: Ameta, 2009). Only limited information has been reported on the use of randomly distributed discrete fibers for highly compressible clayey soil. Thus an experimental programme to study the effect of randomly distributed fibers on highly compressible clayey soil using the triaxial shear test on small sample size and model footing test on large sample has been undertaken.
Vol. 16 [2011], Bund. J Table 1: Engineering Properties of Clayey Soil Used Properties Specific Gravity Grain Size Analysis Gravel, % Sand, % Silt, % Clay, % Consistency Limit Liquid Limit, % Plastic Limit, % Plasticity Index, % Shrinkage Limit, % IS Classification Compaction Study (Standard Compaction Test) Maximum Dry Density, kN/m3 Optimum Moisture Content, % 16.50 16.23 52.9 27.5 25.4 23.5 CH 1 8 66 25
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Value 2.444
Polyester fibers of size 12mm used in this investigation were provided by Relience Industries Limited. The product specifications and photograph of the polyester fibers are given in Table 2 and Figure 1. Due to triangular cross section polyester fibers are better bonded together with clay particle. Table 2: Physical and Engineering Properties of Fibers Used Type Polyester Cut Length 12.1 mm Cross-section Triangular Diameter 30-40 m Tensile Elongation >100% Specific Gravity 1.34 1.39 Tensile Strength 400-600 N/m2 Colour Almost Colorless
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For achieving uniformity, the density and moisture content of unreinforced and fiber reinforced soil were kept constant equal to 16.50 kN/m3 and 16.23 % throughout the test program, thought MDD and OMC were different for unreinforced and fiber reinforced soil. Polyester fiber was mixed manually in clay, till the fiber gets mixed homogeneously with clay. The inside of the tank was marked at every ten cm. The unreinforced and then the fiber reinforced clay were placed in tank in layers of 50mm thickness and each layer was compacted to attain the required density and height. Each layer was properly compacted with tamper having circular base of 150 mm diameter to give required density of 16.50 kN/m3. After filling the tank, the top surface of clay was leveled. The footing was placed in the middle of the tank and after removing 50mm top layer for achieving proper compaction. The level of the footing was checked by sprit level to avoid eccentric loading. The footing was placed over a fine sand layer of thickness 3mm and the center of the plate was coincide with the center of reaction beam, with the help of plumb bob. A ball and socket arrangement was inserted on the footing to keep the direction of the load vertical throughout the test. The proving ring of 50 kN capacity was placed over socket for measuring the load. The hydraulic jack was placed over the proving ring with the loading column in between the jack and reaction beam so as to transfer the load to the plate. The foundation settlement was measured by two dial gauges, each on either side of footing, resting on two magnetic bases. A seating load of 7 kN/m2 was applied and released after 30 minutes before starting the test. The load was applied and increased an increment of about one tenth of the estimated ultimate load. The settlement was observed for each increment of load after an interval of 1, 2.25, 4, 6.25, 9, 16, and 25min and thereafter hourly intervals to the nearest 0.01 mm. The load increment was applied when the rate of settlement reduced to 0.01 mm per hour. From the analogy of pressure bulb, it is inferred that the soil is significantly affected to a depth of 2 to 2.5 times the width of footing so that the soil in tank was removed to a depth more than five times the size of the footing before starting a new test. A load settlement curves were plotted out to arithmetic scale for un reinforced as well for fiber reinforced soils. In the load settlement curve the failure point was not well defined hence settlement was plotted as abscissa against corresponding load intensities as ordinate, both to logarithmic scale. From logarithmic curves the soil bearing capacity (SBC) for unreinforced and fiber reinforced soils were calculated. Soil bearing pressures (SBP) for both the soils are obtained from the following equation. = where B = size of the footing in m, Bp = size of the test plate (model footing) in m = 0.10 m, Sp = settlement of test plate (model footing) in m, and St = settlement of footing in m. (1)
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were found to be 62.4 kN/m2 and 160 kN/m2 respectively for unreinforced soil. Similarly load settlement curves for fiber reinforced soils for various combinations of fiber content and depth of fiber reinforced soil are shown from Figure 4 to Figure 9. The SBC and SBP for fiber reinforced soils are presented in Table 4 and from Figure 10 to Figure 12. The least of SBC & SBP shall be considered as allowable bearing capacity in the designing. For calculating the SBP, size of footing and allowable settlement is taken as 1.5m X 1.5m and 40mm respectively.
Load in kN/m 2
0 0 2 100 200 300 400 500
Settlement in mm
4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Plastic Settlement
100
Yield Stress
Load in kN 2 /m
Elastic Settlement
1 0.1 1 10 100
Settelement in mm
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Load (kN)
0 0 2 4 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Settlement (mm)
6 8 10
Unreinfo rced clay
12 14 16
Figure 4a: Load settlement curve for fiber reinforced soil with 0.25% fibers
0 0 2
Load (kN)
4 5
Settlement (mm)
4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Unreinfo rced clay Clay + 25 mm fiber depth Clay + 50 mm fiber depth Clay + 1 mm fiber 00 d th
Figure 4b: Load settlement curve for fiber reinforced soil with 0.50% fibers
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Load (kN)
0 0 2 4 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Settlement (mm)
6 8 10 12 14 16 Unreinforced clay
Clay + 25 m m fiber depth Clay + 50 m m fiber depth Clay + 100 m m fiber depth
Figure 5: Load settlement curve for fiber reinforced soil with 1.00% fibers
Load (kN)
0 0 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Settlement (mm)
4 6 8 10 12 14
Clay + 0.50% fiber Unreinfo rced clay Clay + 0.25% fiber
16
Clay + 1 % fiber .0
Figure 6: Load settlement curve for fiber reinforced soil with 25 mm depth of fiber reinforced soil
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Settlem ent (m ) m
Figure 7: Load settlement curve for fiber reinforced soil with 50 mm depth of fiber reinforced soil
Load (kN)
0 0 2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Settlement (mm)
4 6 8 10 12 14 16
Unreinfo rced clay Clay + 0.25% fiber Clay + 0.50% fiber Clay + 1 % fiber .0
Figure 8: Load settlement curve for fiber reinforced soil with 100 mm depth of fiber reinforced soil
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So il + 50 mm fiber depth
So il +1 mm fiber depth 00
Fiber Content %
Figure 9: Safe bearing capacity v/s fiber content for various fiber depths
280
2 Safe Bearing Capacity, kN/m
Fiber Depth, mm
Figure 10: Safe bearing capacity v/s fiber depth for various fiber contents
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320
240
160
80
Fiber Content %
Figure 11: Safe bearing pressure v/s fiber content for various fiber depths
400 320
240 160
80
Clay + 1 .0% fiber co ntent
0 0 25 50 75 100 125
Fiber Depth, mm
Figure 12: Safe bearing pressure v/s fiber depth for various fiber contents
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Depth of Fiber Reinforced Soil in mm B/4 (25 mm) B/2 (50 mm) B (100 mm) SBP SBC SBP SBC SBP SBC (kN/m2) (kN/m2) (kN/m2) (kN/m2) (kN/m2) (kN/m2) 190 240 172 210 130 170 200 330 140 310 220 340 152 290 140 270 124.4 220
(2)
Table 5 shows bearing capacity ratio (BCR) calculated at ultimate bearing capacity for fiber reinforced clay.
The load settlement curve for fiber reinforced clay, when depth of fiber reinforced soil is kept 25mm (B/4) is above than that of the unreinforced clay and when the depth is kept 50mm (B/2) and 100mm (B) as shown in Figure 4 to 6. Similarly Figure 7 to 9 shows that the load settlement curve of fiber reinforced soil, when fiber content taken as 0.50% is above than that of the unreinforced clay and when fiber content kept as 0.25% and 1.00%. Thus SBC and SBP both are maximum at 0.50% fiber content and for 25mm depth of fiber reinforced soil, which is shown in Figure 10 to 12. The SBC and SBP for unreinforced clay is 160 kN/m2 and 62.4 kN/m2 respectively which increase to 340 kN/m2 to 220 kN/m2 for fiber reinforced clay for 0.50% fiber content and 25mm depth of fiber reinforced soil. The maximum bearing capacity ratio was observed to be 3.53 for 0.50% fiber content and 50mm depth of fiber reinforced soil.
Triaxial Test
A series of unconsolidated undrained triaxial compression tests on the unreinforced and fiber reinforced highly compressible clay were conducted to determine the effect of fiber on shear strength characteristics of soil. All the tests were done at axial stain rate of 1.25 mm/min. The fibers were mixed thoroughly by hand using rubber gloves in to the dry soil to achieve a fairly uniform mix. The samples were prepared at MDD and OMC for all the tests in triaxial split mold in three equal layers. A total of 15 triaxial tests were conducted to study the influence of fiber content, confining pressure on the strength of fiber reinforced soil. Three tests were conducted on unreinforced clay at confining pressure (CP) of 50 kN/m2, 100 kN/m2 & 150 kN/m2, and
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remaining twelve tests were conducted with fiber content 0.2%, 0.5%, 1.0% & 1.5% with confining pressure (CP) of 50 kN/m2, 100 kN/m2 & 150 kN/m2.
400
300
200
100
0 0.00
0.02
0.04
0.06
0.08
0.10
0.12
Axial Strain
Figure 13: Stress strain curve for unreinforced and fiber reinforced soil for cell pressure of 50 kN/m2
1080
500
400
300
Unreinforced Clay Clay + 0.2 % fiber Clay + 0.5% fiber Clay + 1 FIber .0%
200
100
Clay + 1 fiber .5%
0 0.00
0.02
0.04
0.06
0.08
0.10
0.12
0.14
0.16
Axial Strain
Figure 14: Stress strain curve for unreinforced and fiber reinforced soil for cell pressure of 100 kN/m2
600
Axial Strain
Figure 15: Stress strain curve for unreinforced and fiber reinforced soil for cell pressure of 150 kN/m2
Vol. 16 [2011], Bund. J Table 6: Effect of Fiber Content on Failure Principal Stress
Fiber Content (%) 0.00 Cell Pressure 3 (kN/m2) 50 100 150 50 100 150 50 100 150 50 100 150 50 100 150 Failure Principal Stress 1f (kN/m2) 172 274 336 293 373 467 388 507 638 313 410 547 219 320 410
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0.20
0.50
1.00
1.50
Consolidation Test
Consolidation test was carried out on unreinforced soil in order to determine the settlement characteristics of soil.
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CONCLUSION
There is significant increase in bearing capacity of highly compressible clayey soil with the inclusion polyester fibers. The SBC and SBP both increase with increase in fiber content up to 0.50% and then it decrease with further inclusion of fibers. The SBC and SBP are maximum at 0.50% fiber content having 25 mm depth of fiber reinforced soil (B/4). Thus though the soil is affected to a significant depth of 2 to 2.5 times the width of footing, there is no need to putting the fiber reinforced soil throughout this depth. Only one fourth of width of footing (B/4) is sufficient for increasing the SBC. The SBC and SBP for unreinforced clay is 62.4 t/m2 & 160 kN/m2 which increases to 220 kN/m2 & 310 kN/m2 respectively for fiber reinforced clay with 0.50% fiber and 25 mm depth of fiber reinforced soil. Bearing capacity ratio for fiber reinforced soil was observed 3.53 for 0.50% fiber content with 25 mm fiber depth. The c and values for unreinforced clay were found 59 kN/m2 and 5.500. There is slight increase in c value with inclusion of fibers, but value increase remarkably with increase in fiber content up to 0.5%. At 1.0% fiber content both c and value decrease. The SBC found by model footing test is matching with theoretical SBC for unreinforced soil. Hence good correlation is obtained between the model footing results and theoretical results.
REFERENCES
1. Andersland, O. B. and Khattak, A. S. (1979) Shear Strength of Kaolinite / Fiber Soil Mixtures, Proc. Int. Conf. on Soil Reinforcement, Paris, France. 1, pp. 11-76. 2. Charan, H. D. (1995) Probabilistic Analysis of Randomly Distributed Fiber Reinforced Soil, Ph D Thesis, Dept. of CIvil Engg., I.I.T. Roorkee, India. 3. Gosavi, M., Patil, K. A., Mittal, S. and Saran, S. (2004) Improvement of Properties of Black Cotton Soil Subgrade through Synthetic Reinforcement, J. Institution of Engineers (India), Vol. 84, pp. 257-262. 4. Gray, D.H. and Oshashi, H. (1983) Mechanics of Fiber-reinforcement in Sand, JI. Geotech. Engg., ASCE, 109 (3), pp. 335-353. 5. Hoare, D. J. (1979) Laboratory Study of Granular Soils Reinforced with Randomly Oriented Discrete Fibers, Proc. Int. Conf. on Use of Fabrics in Geotech., Paris, France. 1, pp. 47-52. 6. Kaniraj, S. R. and Havanagi, V. G. (2001) Geotechnical Behavior of Fly Ash soil Mixtures, JI. of Geotextiles and Geomembranes, 21, pp. 123-149. 7. Kaniraj, S. R. and Havanagi, V. G. (2001) Behavior of Cement stabilized Fiberreinforced Fly Ashsoil Mixtures Geotech. Geoenv. Eng., ASCE, 127(7), pp. 574-584. 8. Maher, M. H. and Gray, D. H. (1990) Static Response Sands Reinforced with Randomly Distributed Fibers, JI. Geotech. Engg., ASCE, 116 (11), pp. 1661- 1677. 9. Michalowski, R. L. and Cermak, J. (2003) Triaxial Compression of Sand Reinforced with Fibers, J. Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engg., ASCE, 129 (2), pp. 125-136 10. Michalowski, R. L. and Zaho, H. (1996) Failure of Fiber reinforced Granular Soils, JI. Geotech. Engg., ASCE, 122 (3) , pp. 226-333. 11. Gupta, P. and Saran, S. (2008) Behaviour of Fiber Reinforced Sand in Different Test Conditions JI. Indian Geotechnical Journal, pp.272-282. 12. Ameta N K, Purohit D G M, Wayal A S. (2009) Behaviour of Square Footing on Dune Sand Reinforced with Nylon Fiber Intl J. of Geotechnical Engineering, pp 313-317.
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