Ground Improvement (2005) 9, No.

1, 1722

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Plastic limit and compaction characteristics of negrained soils

A. SRIDHARAN* and H. B. NAGARAJ
*Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India; BMS College of Engineering, Bangalore, India
Laboratory determination of the compaction characteristics of soils is important for use in earthwork constructions. The purpose of compacting earth lls such as earth dams and embankments (highway, railway and canal) is to produce a soil mass that will satisfy the two basic criteria: reduction in settlement and increase in shear strength. For preliminary design and assessment, correlations with the liquid limit have been attempted by various investigators. However, from the present study it is seen that the correlations are not up to a satisfactory level. In this paper the results of detailed investigations carried out are examined to nd which of the index properties correlate well with the compaction characteristics. In the analysis, apart from the authors experimental results, results from the available literature have also been considered. It is found that the plastic limit bears a good correlation with the compaction characteristics, namely optimum moisture content and maximum dry unit weight, much better than liquid limit or plasticity index. La determination en laboratoire des caracteristiques de compaction des sols est importante pour les constructions ` a terrassement. Les remblais de terre compactee comme les levees de terre et les talus (autoroutes, voies ferrees et canaux) ont pour but de produire une masse de sol qui ` satisfera deux criteres de base : la reduction du tassement et lamelioration de la resistance au cisaillement. Pour la conception preliminaire et levaluation, divers chercheurs ont tente detablir des correlations avec la limite liquide. Cependant, cette etude montre que les correlations ne sont pas dun niveau satisfaisant. Dans cet expose, nous examinons les resultats de ces recherches detaillees an de trouver celles des proprietes indice qui correspondent le mieux aux caracteristiques de compaction. Dans cette analyse, outre les resultats experimentaux obtenus par les auteurs, les resultats disponibles publies ont egalement ete pris en compte. Nous avons trouve que la limite plastique montre une bonne correlation avec les caracteris tiques de compaction, nommement la teneur en eau optimum et le poids unitaire sec maximum, bien mieux quavec lindice de limite liquide ou lindice de plasticite.

Keywords : clays; compaction; earth lls; embankments; ground improvement; laboratory tests

Notation
e GS IP IS OMC Sr w wL wP wS d d max w (d )P void ratio specic gravity of soils plasticity index shrinkage index wL wS optimum moisture content degree of saturation water content liquid limit plastic limit shrinkage limit dry unit weight of soils maximum dry unit weight of soils unit weight of water dry unit weight at plastic limit water content

Introduction
Soil compaction is the process whereby soil particles are constrained to pack more closely together through a reduction in the air voids, and generally through mechanical means. The purpose of compacting earth lls such as earth dams and embankments (highway, railway and canal) is to produce a soil mass that will satisfy the two basic criteria: reduction in settlement, and increase in shear strength. Many other engineering structures constructed on soils, such as highways, railway subgrade and aireld pavements, also require compaction. Compaction increases the strength characteristics of soils, which in turn increases the bearing capacity of foundations constructed over them. It also decreases the amount of undesirable settlement of structures and increases the stability of slopes of embankments. Compaction plays a vital role in the preparation of a good compacted soil liner in waste impoundment sites to make them relatively impervious to leachates and thereby reduce the threat of groundwater pollution. Thus compaction is used as a practical means of achieving the desired strength and compressibility and also hydraulic conductivity characteristics of the soils used. The compaction characteristics of a soil as obtained from a laboratory compaction test are maximum dry unit weight
1365-781X # 2005 Thomas Telford Ltd

(GI 3173) Paper received 17 February 2003; last revised 22 March 2004; accepted 21 April 2004

Sridharan and Nagaraj (d max ) and optimum moisture content (OMC). In the construction of many earth structures, such as embankments, it is essential to assess the suitability of a soil with respect to the compaction characteristics. Also, such projects require large quantities of soil, and it may be difcult to obtain the desired type of soil from one borrow area alone. To obtain the compaction characteristics from laboratory compaction requires considerable time and effort. So, for a preliminary assessment of the suitability of soils required for the project, it is preferable to use the correlation of engineering properties with simple index tests. Attempts have been made in the past to correlate the compaction characteristics with the liquid limit. However, such correlations appear to be less than satisfactory. In this paper, based both on detailed experimental investigations and on an analysis of the published data on ne-grained soils, a study has been made to discover which of the index properties correlate well with the compaction characteristics.

Optimum moisture content: % 16.2

Maximum dry unit weight, d max : kN/m3 17.9

24.0 31.4 21.2

29.0 35.1 28.0 14.1 12.9 14.2 32.0 17.5 38.0 67.0 64.5 42.5 1.0 18.0 19.5 21.9 35.4 45.0

Clay: % 26.0

Mineralogy

Correlation of compaction characteristics with index properties: state of the art

Although the compaction characteristics are very important for eld considerations, few attempts have been made in the past to predict them. An early attempt to predict the compaction characteristics was made by Johnson and Sallberg (1962). They developed a chart to determine the approximate optimum moisture content of a soil using the standard compaction test. The chart is a plot of plastic limit against liquid limit. Different zones of optimum moisture content were indicated by means of numerous curves. This is a useful chart in predicting only the optimum moisture content of the soil from its liquid limit and plastic limit. Recently Pandian et al. (1997) have proposed a method to predict the compaction characteristics in terms of the liquid limit. They proposed the following two equations to assess the compaction path on the dry side and wet side of optimum. Dry side of optimum: w p 9:46 0:2575w L Sr Wet side of optimum: w 10:61 0:3615w L S2 r (1)

Grain size distribution

Silt: % 38.5

5.0 9.5 35.0

Sand: % 35.5

58.5 74.5 57.0

IS : % 22.3

36.5 16.0 8.0

11.6 9.0 32.5

12.3 34.4 61.6 8 9 10 Kaolinite 3 Illitic soil Black cotton soil 1 2.65 2.58 2.70 58.7 73.4 73.5 45.2 51.9 35.6 46.4 39.0 11.9 13.5 21.5 37.9

0.0 0.9 13.0 GS , specic gravity; wL , liquid limit; wP , plastic limit; wS , shrinkage limit; IP , plasticity index; IS , shrinkage index.

IP : % 19.0

wS : % 14.7

9.5 12.4 26.7

wP : % 18.0

27.4 39 15.5

wL : % 37.0

29.5 35.6 21.3

where Sr is the degree of saturation, wL is the liquid limit in percent, and w is the water content Pandian et al. (1997) proposed a series of predicted compaction curves for Proctor compaction effort. For different values of degree of saturation, in the range of 50% , Sr , 85% on the dry side of optimum and 85% , Sr , 95% on the wet side of optimum, the water content can be calculated using equations (1) and (2) respectively. With the help of the predicted set of compaction curves, the dry unit weight can be determined, and hence the dry unit weightwater contents path. 18

Table 1. Index properties of soils used

Soil no.

Red earth 1

Silty soil 1 Kaolinite 1 Red earth 2

2 3 4

5 6 7

Kaolinite 2 Cochin clay (oven dried) Brown soil 1

Soil type

2.64 2.61 2.66

Gs 2.70

2.65 2.65 2.70

(2)

39.0 48.0 48.0

55.0 56.4 58.5

31.4 38.1 32.1

33.1 21.0 13.5

23.6 18.3 26.4

88.5 71.6 35.5

11.5 27.5 51.5

Kaolinite, montmorillonite, muscovite, quartz Illite, quartz Kaolinite, quartz Kaolinite, montmorillonite, muscovite, quartz Kaolinite, quartz Illite Montmorillonite, kaolinite, muscovite, quartz Kaolinite, quartz Illite, kaolinite, quartz Montmorillonite, quartz

12.2 11.1 13.5

15.2 13.3 16.0

39.7 44.4 31.2

Plastic limit and compaction characteristics of ne-grained soils

Scope for improvement

Johnson and Sallberg (1962) developed a chart to predict only the optimum moisture content, but did not suggest any correlative chart or method to predict maximum dry unit weight. Without knowing the maximum dry unit weight the prediction of compaction characteristics is not complete. The method suggested by Pandian et al. (1997) predicts the compaction characteristics in terms of liquid limit alone. Using liquid limit alone in predicting engineering properties has limitations, in that soils having the same liquid limit but different plasticity characteristics will behave differently. This investigation aims to clarify this aspect.

Results and discussion

Figure 1 shows a typical plot of dry unit weight against moisture content for a pair of soils having nearly the same liquid limit, but with different plasticity characteristics. It can be seen from the gure that, although the liquid limit is nearly the same, the compaction curves are vastly different (including the optimum moisture content and maximum dry unit weight). Further, from Fig. 1 it can also be observed that the soil with the higher plastic limit has a higher optimum moisture content and a lower maximum dry unit weight than the soil having a lower plastic limit, although the liquid limit of both the soils is nearly the same. Similar behaviour is observed for the other pairs of soils (Table 1). Hence prediction of compaction characteristics from the liquid limit alone is not justied.
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Methodology
Materials
As soil type is important in studying the compaction characteristics of soils, 10 soils including both natural soils and commercially available kaolinites were selected, covering a wide range of liquid limits. The soils selected were in pairs, with each pair having similar liquid limit values but different plasticity properties. This was done to bring out the effect of plasticity characteristics on the compaction characteristics of ne-grained soils. The physical properties of the 10 soils are reported in Table 1. The 10 soils were characterised for their physical propertiesspecic gravity, liquid limit, plastic limit, shrinkage limit and grain size distributionusing standard procedures as specied in BS 1377 Part 2 (BSI, 1990a). The test results are reported in Table 1. A mineralogical analysis of each soil was performed using an X-ray diffractometer. The principal clay minerals present in each soil type are given in Table 1. The compaction test was done for the 10 soils using the standard Proctor mould (BSI, 1990b). For each soil a minimum of ve trials were done with varying initial water content to get the compaction curve.
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Symbol

Source Present study McRae (1958)

Data points 10 18 5 3 15 13

60 Optimum moisture content, OMC: %

Johnson and Sallberg (1960) Foreman and Daniel (1986) Sridharan et al. (1990) Benson and Trast (1995)

50 OMC 5 037 (wL 1 1246) 40 r 5 080

30

20

10 20 40 60 80 Liquid limit, wL: % (a)

Symbol Source Present study McRae (1958)

100

120

Data points 10 18 5 3 15 13

Symbol Soil no. 4 3

Maximum dry unit weight, d max: kN/m3

wL: %

wP: d max: OMC: % kN/m3 % 160 133 212 314

20

Johnson and Sallberg (1960) Foreman and Daniel (1986) Sridharan et al. (1990) Benson and Trast (1995)

18

480 213 480 356

d max 5 009 (218 2 wL) r 5 080

17 Dry unit weight, d: kN/m3 ZAV line G 5 270 16

15

15 ZAV line G 5 265

14

10 13 0 12 15 50 Liquid limit, wL: % (b) 100

20

25 30 Moisture content: %

35

40

Fig. 1. Dry unit weight against moisture content for a set of two soils with liquid limit 48% (ZAV (zero air voids))

Fig. 2 (a) Optimum moisture content and (b) maximum dry unit weight against liquid limit for soils both from the present study and from the literature

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Sridharan and Nagaraj In order to check the validity of the above nding, compaction data from the literature (McRae, 1958; Johnson and Sallberg, 1960; Foreman and Daniel, 1986; Sridharan et al., 1990; Benson and Trast, 1995) were also plotted along with the data from present study. Fig. 2(a) shows a plot of optimum moisture content against the liquid limit from the compaction data of the literature and the present study. It can be seen from the gure that, although there is an increasing trend of optimum moisture content with an increase in the liquid limit, there is considerable scatter, particularly at higher values of the liquid limit. Similarly Fig. 2(b) shows a plot of maximum dry unit weight against the liquid limit, which shows a decreasing trend with increase in the liquid limit, but again with a lot of scatter. Thus the compaction data from the literature also support the present study that correlation of the compaction characteristics with the liquid limit is not justied. Figure 3 shows typical compaction curves for a pair of soils having nearly the same plasticity index. It can be seen that the compaction characteristics are vastly different. Similar results for other pairs of soils can be observed from Table 1. An attempt has been made to correlate the optimum moisture content with the plasticity index, using data both from the authors experimental results and from the literature. Poor correlation has been obtained. As the plastic limit is an important parameter, it was felt that the compaction characteristics could be well correlated with it. Figs 4(a) and 4(b) show plots of dry unit weight against moisture content for two soil pairs having nearly the same plastic limit. From the gures it is clear that the compaction curves are very similar, and the compaction characteristics (optimum moisture content and maximum dry unit weight) are almost the same. Further, to verify this observation, the compaction test results from the present study were plotted relating dry unit weight and the moisture content, as shown in Fig. 5. The plastic limit water contents of the soils are marked on the respective compaction curves. It can be seen that the compaction curves of the 10 soils are placed in the order of their plastic limits, and that the optimum moisture content of each soil is slightly less than the respective plastic limits. Figures 6(a) and 6(b)
150

Symbol Soil no. 5

wL: %

wP: d max: OMC: % kN/m3 % 141 142 290 280

550 314 585 321

145

Dry unit weight, d: kN/m3

140

135

130

125 15

20

25 30 Moisture content: % (a) Symbol Soil no. 10 3 wL: %

35

40

140

wP: d max: OMC: % kN/m3 % 135 133 332 314

735 356 480 356

135 Dry unit weight, d: kN/m3

130

125

17

120 20 Symbol Soil no. wL: % 4 7 IP : % d max: OMC: kN/m3 % 160 142 212 280

25

30 35 Moisture content: % (b)

40

45

480 267 585 264

16

Fig. 4 Dry unit weight against moisture content for a set of two soils with plastic limit approximately: (a) 32%; (b) 36%

Dry unit weight, d: kN/m3

15

14

13

show plots of the optimum moisture content against the plastic limit and the maximum dry unit weight against the plastic limit using data both from the present study and from the literature. The correlation of the compaction characteristics with the plastic limit is good. Correlation of the optimum moisture content with the plastic limit, as obtained from Fig. 6(a), is given by the following equation, with a correlation coefcient of 0.99: OMC 0:92w P (3) One can suggest some reasons why OMC should correlate well with the plastic limit. A close examination of the plastic limit test procedure reveals that, when the water content is above the plastic limit, the rolled thread will not crumble, even on reaching 3 mm diameter. When the water content is less than the plastic limit, the soil thread will crumble at a diameter more than 3 mm. This suggests that there is an

12 15

20

25 30 Moisture content: %

35

40

Fig. 3. Dry unit weight against moisture content for a set of two soils with plasticity index approximately 24%

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Plastic limit and compaction characteristics of ne-grained soils

21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 20 10 10 20 30 40 Moisture content: % 50 60 ZAV line G 5 270 60

Soil no. Soil description 1 2 3 5 8 10 4 6 8 9 Red earth-1 Red earth-2 Silty soil-1 Kaolinite-2 Brown soil-1 BC soil-1 Kaolinite-1 Cochin clay Kaolinite-3 Illitic soil

wL: %

wP: %

(d)P: kN/m3 175 159 146 138 136 132 128 125 112 102

Symbol

Source Present study McRae (1958) Johnson and Sallberg (1960) Foreman and Daniel (1986) Sridharan et al. (1990) Benson and Trast (1995)

Data points 10 18 5 3 15 13

370 180 480 213 390 295 550 314 585 321 735 356 480 356 564 381 587 452 734 530

50 Optimum moisture content, OMC: %

40

OMC 5 092 wP --- (3) Line of equality r 5 099

Dry unit weight, d: kN/m3

30

Plastic limit
Relationship between wP and d

20

10

10

20

30 40 Plastic limit, wP: % (a)

Symbol Source Present study McRae (1958) Johnson and Sallberg (1960) Foreman and Daniel (1986)

50

60

Data points 10 18 5 3 15 13

Maximum dry unit weight, d max: kN/m3

18

Sridharan et al. (1990) Benson and Trast (1995)

Fig. 5. Dry unit weight against moisture content for all the soils used in the present study (dry density at plastic limit water content, (d )P ) (ZAV (zero air voids))

d max 5 023 (9333 2 wP) --- (4) 16 r 5 093

optimum water content at which the soil thread crumbles when the diameter is 3 mm. Similarly, in the compaction process, there is a water content (optimum water content) at which the dry unit weight is maximum for any compactive effort. Here that optimum water content is observed near to the plastic limit. Similarly, from Fig. 6(b), the equation for maximum dry unit weight in terms of plastic limit is d max 0:23(93:3 w P ) (4) where dmax is the maximum dry unit weight in kN/m3 , and wP is the plastic limit in percent. If an assumption is made regarding the degree of saturation at the optimum moisture content, which is found to be around 85% from the present study as well as from the data reported by Pandian et al. (1997), and about the specic gravity of the soil (Gs ), then the maximum dry unit weight (d max ) can be obtained from the following basic relations: d and can be stated as: d max Gs w 1 wGs = Sr (5) Gs w wGs and e 1e Sr

14

12

10 10 20 30 40 Plastic limit, wP: % (b) 50 60

Fig. 6 (a) Optimum moisture content and (b) maximum dry unit weight against plastic limit for soils both from the present study and from the literature

However, the plastic limit is shown to correlate well with the compaction characteristics, namely optimum moisture content and maximum dry unit weight. Data from the literature also support this correlation. Based on both the present study and data from the literature, the following correlation equations are proposed to predict the compaction characteristics: OMC 0:92w P d max 0:23(93:3 w P ) (3) (4)

Conclusions
A compaction study with ve different pairs of soils, with each pair having nearly the same liquid limit, has shown that the compaction characteristics do not correlate well with either the liquid limit or the plasticity index of the soils.

References
Benson C. H. and Trast J. M. (1995) Hydraulic conductivity of thirteen compacted clays. Clays and Clay Minerals, 43, No. 6, 669681.

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Sridharan and Nagaraj

BSI (1990a) British Standard Methods of Test for Engineering Purposes: Classication Tests. British Standards Institution, Milton Keynes, BS 1377: Part 2. BSI (1990b) British Standard Methods of Test for Engineering Purposes: Compaction-Related Tests. British Standards Institution, Milton Keynes, BS 1377: Part 4. Foreman E. D. and Daniel D. E. (1986) Permeation of compacted clay with organic chemicals. Journal of the Geotechnical Engineering Division, ASCE, 112, No. 7, 669681. Johnson A. W. and Sallberg J. R. (1960) Factors that inuence eld compaction of soils (compaction characteristics of eld equipment). Highway Research Board Bulletin, No. 272, 14. Johnson A. W. and Sallberg J. R. (1962) Factors inuencing compaction results. Highway Research Board Bulletin, No. 319, 125.

McRae J. L. (1958) Index of compaction characteristics. Symposium on Application of Soil Testing in Highway Design and Construction, ASTM Special Technical Publication No. 239, pp. 119127. Pandian N. S., Nagaraj T. S. and Manoj M. (1997) Re-examination of compaction characteristics of ne-grained soils. Geotechnique, 47, No. 2, 363366. Sridharan A., Rao S. M. and Joshi S. (1990) Classication of expansive soils by sediment volume method. Geotechnical Testing Journal, 13, No. 4, 375380.

Discussion contributions on this paper should reach the editor by 1 July 2005

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