SOIL MECHANICS & INTRO

TO GEOLOGY

EC421

Dr. C. Kambole

WHY SOIL MECH & GEOLOGY IN

RAILWAY ENGINEERING?
• Most railways are built on the ground, and
run for much of their length within or on
geotechnical structures such as ground
cuttings, tunnels and embankments.
• The principles of soil mechanics, which
underlie the practice of geotechnical
engineering, can equally be applied to a
ballasted trackbed.
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Rail track on an embankment

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 STANDARDS
• Some Internationally acknowledged
standards for study & practice, for a long
time:
– BS 1377: – Soil Mech for C. E. purposes
– BS 5930: - Code of practice for Site Investigations
– ASTM Vol 0.4.08: Soil & Rock, Building Stones,
Geotextiles; Published by American Society for
Testing & materials
– DIN 113 – German Standards for soil & Rock
– SANS – 3001 Series
• EURO CODES set to replace BS Standards?? 5

SYMBOLS & UNITS

We’ll stick to internationally acknowledged symbols for
various soil parameters; Some common ones include:
• A, a [cm2] X-sectional area
• B, b [m] width of structure
• Cc [ ] Compression index
• Cu [N/m ] 2 Undrained Strength
• Dr [%] Relative density
• D10 [μm] Particle size of which %age is finer
that size
• e[ ] Void ratio
• F[ ] Factor of safety

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 SOIL - Definition
‘SOIL’ has various definitions, depending upon the general
field in which it is being considered.

• For Pedologists ... Soil is the substance existing on the

earth's surface on which plant life grows and develops.

• For Geologists ..... Soil is the material in the relative thin

surface zone within which roots occur. The rest of the
earth’s crust is regarded as ROCK, irrespective of its
hardness.

• *To the Engineer .... Soil is the un-aggregated or un-

cemented deposits of mineral and/or organic
particles or fragments covering large portion of the
earth's crust.
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• Soil Mechanics - one of the ‘youngest’

disciplines of Civil Engineering involving the
study of soil, its behavior and application as an
engineering material.

• "Soil Mechanics is the application of laws of

mechanics and hydraulics to engineering
problems dealing with sediments and other
unconsolidated accumulations of solid particles
produced by the mechanical and chemical
disintegration of rocks regardless of whether or
not they contain an admixture of organic
constituent." Terzaghi (1948)

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 ORIGIN & TYPES
• Soil is mostly produced from rock weathering.
Weathering is a geological process and can be
Chemical or Physical.

• The weathering products have variations in

Particle sizes and shapes depending on:
– The Weathering Process
– The Transportation Process

• Variation in Soil Structure Depends on:

– Soil Minerals
– Deposition Process
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Transportation and Deposition

• Four ‘agents’ usually cause the
transportation and deposition of soils
1- Water >> Alluvial Soil
a- Fluvial – deposited by action of rivers
b- Estuarine – deposited where fresh & sea water
intermix
c- Lacustrine – deposited at bottom of lakes
d- Coastal – along coastline of oceans & seas
e- Marine - formed from materials carried into the seas
by streams and by material eroded from the beaches
by the tidal action of the waves

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2- Ice >> Glacial Soils
a- Hard Pan
b- Terminal Moraine
c- Esker
d- Kettles

3- Wind >> Aeolian Soils

a- Sand Dunes
b- Loess

4- Gravity >> Colluvial Soil

a. Talus

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Type of soils usually produced by the

different weathering & transportation
process
• Boulders
• Gravel Cohesionless
• Sand (Physical)
• Silt Cohesive
• Clay (Chemical)

These soils can be

• Dry
• Saturated - Fully
• Partially

Also they have different shapes and textures

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 SOIL DESCRIPTION AND
CLASSIFICATION
SOIL DESCRIPTION is meant to convey sufficient
information to enable designers and contractors:
a.to appreciate the nature & properties of the soils
b.to anticipate the likely behaviour & potential problems

SOIL GROUPS
1.MADE GROUND – man made layer of material deposited
or dumped over natural ground – can be spread and
compacted in layers OR randomly, variable material formed
by dumping of variety of waste products (excavation spoil,
demolition rubble, domestic refuse, etc)
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2. TOP SOIL – Comprises of humus-rich

soil usually on top of the natural
‘inorganic’ soils & rocks. (Humus is
formed from microbial breakdown of
plant & animal tissue)
o Provides support to plant life.
o Usually 100 – 300 mm thick, but can be as
high as 1m in the TROPICS.
Major use – landscaping & supporting
erosion protection

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3. FINES – particles smaller than 60μm comprising
CLAY and SILT

CLAY
• According to BSCS – a soil comprising 35 – 100%
fines where the clay particles predominate to
produce cohesion, plasticity and low permeability.
• Description of clay in engineering reports
commonly follows the following order: STRENGTH
/ MASS STRUCTURE / COLOUR / SOIL NAME /
of XXX PLASCTICTY / WITH OTHER
STRUCTURE, followed by Geological formation or
type of deposit (e.g. London Clay, Musofu
formation, etc)
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SRENGTH TERMS
Term Undrained Field Identification
shear
strength [kN/m2]
Very soft <20 Exudes between fingers when
squeezed in hand
Soft 20 - 40 Moulded easily by finger
pressure
Soft to firm 40 - 50

Firm 50 - 75 Can be moulded easily by strong

finger pressure
Firm to stiff 75 - 100

Stiff 100 - 150 Cannot be moulded by fingers

but can be indented with thumb
Very stiff 150 - 300 Can be indented by thumb nail
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Hard > 300 Broken with difficulty

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 MASS STRUCTURE

Typical terms used to describe the mass

structure of soils include:
• BEDDING – thickly, medium, thinly
• Interstratified – such as where bedding
surfaces separate easily or not
• Discontinuities – joints, fissures, shear
planes, etc
COLOUR
• – tone & shade
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Soil COLOR TERMS – after BS5930

Tone Shade COLOUR

Light Pinkish Pink
Dark Reddish Red
Mottled Orangeish Orange
Variegated Yellowish Yellow
Greenish Green
Brownish Brown
Greyish Grey, black
Blueish Blue
Purplish Purple
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 SOIL STRUCTURE & CLAY
MINERALS
• Soil Structure:- The mode of arrangement
of soil particles relative to each other and
the forces acting between them to hold
them in position
• Includes mineralogical composition of soil
grains, ionic composition of pore water, etc

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Formation of soil structure is governed by

several factors:
• Coarse Grained soils:-force of gravity is
the main factor
• Fine grained soils:- surface bonding
forces is the main factor.
– The specific surface (ratio of surface area to
the mass/volume) greatly affects the surface
bonding
– Smaller particles have much larger specific
surface than large particles
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 CLAY
• Normally understood to refer to a soil whose
grains are predominantly composed of clay
minerals and one which has plasticity &
cohesion.
• Presence of water plays a decisive role in the
engineering behaviour of clay soil
Clay minerals
• Are components that give cohesive
characteristics to a soil deposit
• Very active electrochemically and presence of
just a small amount can appreciably alter
engineering characteristics of a soil mass
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CLAY MINERALS
There are four main groups of clay minerals:
• Kaolinite group - includes kaolinite, dickite, nacrite, and
halloysite; formed by the decomposition of orthoclase
feldspar (e.g. in granite); kaolin is the principal
constituent in china clay.
• Illite group- also includes hydrous micas, phengite,
brammalite, celadonite, and glauconite (a green clay
sand); formed by the decomposition of some micas and
feldspars; predominant in marine clays and shales.
• Smectite group- also includes montmorillonite,
bentonite, nontronite, hectorite, saponite and sauconite;
formed by the alteration of mafic igneous, rocks rich in
Ca and Mg; weak linkage by cations (e.g. Na+, Ca++)
results in, high swelling/shrinking potential
• Vermiculite

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 IDENTIFYING CLAY MINERALS
The basic methods used for clay mineral
identification and quantification involve:
• X-ray diffraction (XRD)
– identifies the molecular structure and minerals
present
• Differential thermal analyses (DTA)
– identifies the minerals present
• Electron microscopy (EM) is also
employed for complementary mineral
characterizations.
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• Scanning Electron Microscope

 common technique to
see clay particles
 qualitative

plate-like
structure

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 SILT
• This is soil comprising 35 – 100% fines
where the silt is predominant. Has some
dilatancy, has fairly low permeability. Can
be non-plastic or plastic
• NON-PLASTIC silt should be described in
the following order: DENSITY / COLOUR /
GRAIN SIZE / NON-PLASTIC / soil
NAME / with other structure

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DENSITY – Terms based on SPT

SPT ‘N’ ‘Density’ • MASS STRUCTURE

value – same as or CLAY
0-4 Very loose • GRAIN SIZE – can
4 - 10 Loose be recorded as fine,
medium or coarse
10 - 30 Medium
depending on results
Dense
of sedimentation test
30 - 50 Dense
> 50 Very
Dense
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 Soil NAME
Gravel & Cobble
inclusions (BS 5930)
• Given in capital letters
Term Approx %ge
– SILT (sand 0 – 35%) of inclusions
– Sandy SILT (sand 35 With little gravel 5
– 65%) or occasional
cobbles
Could have gravel or
With gravel or 5 - 20
cobbles, then described with cobbles
according to the table With much 20 - 40
herewith gravel or with
many cobbles
and gravel or 50 - 65
and cobbles
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PLASTIC SILT
• Will exhibit some cohesion & plasticity &
can be described in same way as a clay
soil
• Soil NAME should reflect degree of
cohesion or plasticity with such names as:
– Clayey SILT – moderate cohesion, some
plasticity
• Silt soils will tend to lie below the A-line on
the plasticity chart & so can be
distinguished from clay in this way
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 Silt soil Description - Examples
• Medium dense very thinly bedded light
brown medium to coarse non-plastic
sandy SILT (Glacial Silt)
• Firm pinkish brown clayey SILT of low
plasticity with many thin (<2mm) bands of
silty clay of high plasticity (Laminated Silty
/ Clay)

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SAND & GRAVEL

• According to BS5930 – this contains up to 35%
fines. If these fines are clayey, they may have great
influence on the soil’s behaviour
• Order of description of sand and / or gravel:
DENSITY / MASS STRUCTURE / MINOR
CONSTITUENT / GRAIN SIZE / soil NAME / with
other STRUCTURE
• Colour & mass structure terms are described as
given before
• Grain size may be assessed by visual inspection
supplemented by sieving tests & described as fine,
medium & coarse Sand or Gravel
• Grain shape may also be assessed visually
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 Typical Sand & Gravel soils in
relation to sand content
Term Sand Content (%)
Slightly sandy GRAVEL Up to 5
Sandy GRAVEL 5 – 20
Very sandy GRAVEL 20 – 40
SAND & GRAVEL 40 – 60
Very gravelly SAND 60 – 80
Gravelly SAND 80 – 95
Slightly gravelly SAND >95
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Examples of Sand & Gravel soil

Descriptions
• Medium dense brown slightly silty very
sandy fine to coarse GRAVEL (Flood plain
Gravel)
• Loose yellowish brown very silty fine to
medium gravelly SAND, gravel fine to
coarse subrounded, structure not
distinguished (Glacial Sand)

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 COBBLES & BOULDERS
• Particles greater than 200 mm & 600 mm
respectively
• Not usually included in the particle size
distribution test by sieving
• Normally removed from a sample ‘by hand’ and
their proportion estimated

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PEAT & ORGANIC soils

• PEAT – easily distinguished by its dark
brown to black colour, high organic
content, high moisture content, lightweight
nature, esp when dried.
• When significant organic particles are
present – organic soil

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