CHAPTER ONE

1. BACKGROUND OF THE COMPANY

1.1 INTRODUCTION

  It is planned based on the benefit which it gives for both the students and their hosting company.

This report has been written because it is curtail to senior students like me to real exposure for the
practical application of what we learnt in the class.

As mention in the first paragraph students and the company can benefit from this program; for
instance; Students

- Have opportunity to develop interpersonal skill with workers

- Have opportunity to gain practical skill

For the Company;

- They have an opportunity to obtain well skilled persons

- They gate opportunity to advert

Betret International Sub contractor is multidisciplinary involved in logistic, construction,

transportation, and, related work. The company under takes construction works as grade 2
contractor, transports and supply construction materials and leases construction equipment and
machineries development of Betret International Sub contractor company activities is based on a
well-defined corporate culture highlighted by the following value.

 A firm commitment to profitability with the aim of the company’ future

 The confidence of its customers won as a result of company’s commitment to

guaranteeing their satisfaction with quality acquired.

 The convection that all activities must be based on the respect on environments and

the sustainable development of the society.

 The commitment to perform high quality construction works with activities

participation of team of dedication skill professionals.

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The technical staffs working on site and in the office are well qualified and experienced in

different field of construction.

In addition structure of company allows flexibility and adjustability to fit demanding

environment, timely and well-planned of the supply of the resources is an asset that company

developed throughout its past career. Most of the machines deployed for its works are either new

and in a very good construction.

1.2 Vision of the company

As a growing company, Betret International construction plc has boost the company’s equipment
management capacity by overcoming the apparent problem of shortage of spare parts supply and
lack of adequate and efficient repair facility of heavy duty equipment’s in the country. Highly
qualified expatriates staffs are expected to be involved in this work.

Generally the vision is to be an internationally competitive construction company.

1.3 Mission of the company

 Deliver quality services to the satisfaction of clients.

 Provide context oriented engineering solution to civil works project to be carried
out in the country and abroad.

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 1.4 ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE OF THE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY AT
HEAD QUARTER

Managing Director

EXC. Secretary

Administration and
Finance Department Technical

Department

Finance Division Road and Bridge Department

Personnel Adminst. Division Building construction Department

Logistic and supplies Division Electro Mechanical Department

Transports and Garage Division Machinery Rental Department

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CHAPTER TWO

2. MANAGEMENT, TRAINING AND EMPLOYEE INFORMATION

First, we ask our hosting company to give us the supervisor. The project manager contacts us
with site engineer, site foreman, site workers and office secretors. We asked the project manager
to give us work if there is work on their office or on site concerned to us. The construction
company site engineer Simon Tadesse assigned us to checking drawing design, visit site,
schedule construction work and construction sequence, and the work is being done from
materials and by methods specified in specification.

Besides we understand about technical specification, structural specification, earth work

specification, material specification and survey specification of Ethiopian Road Authority.

For example

1. Stone
Should be uniform, durable and free from cracks
Should be less than 150mm
Top and bottom face should be parallel to each other
Thickness should be 200-300mm
Width should be 1-2.5 time of the thickness and length 1.5-3 times of the
thickness.

2. Masonry mortar
2.1 Sand: Soil content <5% , Organic impurities content<3%
2.2 Cement: 42.5mpa OPC cement packed in original Package within 28 days
2.3 water: Tap or clean free of hazardous substance

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 3. Equipment

3.1 For structure: mortar mixer, shovel, barrel, balance, trowel, measuring tap,
chisel, hammer, water level …

3.2 For earth work: dozer, grader, dam trucker, roller, loader, excavator, water
trucker, etc.

3.3 For surveying: theodolite, tape, level, peg, etc.

Additionally, intern develops how the weekly report is prepared in the site of the project.

2.1 Project management

If one word could describe the essence of the project management, it is responsibility. The
project manager is responsible for all activities in the project. This does not mean the project
manager do everything associated with the project; it does means the project manager own
ultimate responsibility for the project, regardless who is on the project team and obstacle
encountered along the way to successful completion.

The technical knowledge and skill required to be a successful project manager are wide
ranging. In fact, you don’t need to be an expert in all of them, you do, however, need to have
engineering experience, technical experience, and, will and commitment to take on the overall
responsibility for your projects.

The project manager’s responsibility is to manage the financial, technical and schedule on time,
within budget and with a technical quality that meets or exceeds the contractual performance and
specification.

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 2.2 Major duties we assigned
We can divide our duties into; office works, site works and administrative work.

2.2.1 Site works

- Checking site work to ensure compliance with specification and drawings

- Inspecting construction site to monitor progress and ensure conformance to
engineering plans, specifications, and construction standards
- Direct supervision of the masons to ensure good performance
, stay with the construction schedule and maintain quality of work and
standards
- Managing construction activities at project site
- Overseeing the work and making sure it runs smoothing and plan
- Making sure company rule followed by crew
- Giving over directions to workers as to what needs to be done to avoid
repetitive mistake by the workers

2.2.2 Administrative works

- Check design and auditing drawing

- Control site work quality

- Manage workers.

Through our internship duration in the company, we would like to thank our supervisors for

their kind help guiding and giving orientation in each activity before we start practicing the main

activities. Without help of our supervisor, we wouldn’t have achieve the knowledge and

experiences we have gained now.

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 Our supervisor helps us by;

1. Guiding and giving orientation in each activities

2. Brief description of what will be done in each activity

3. Reacting politely to our questions

4. Providing an access of materials as much as possible.

5. Give us new engineering tasks and monitoring our progress

As organization consists workers with different; educational back ground, ethnic back ground,

religion and characters, and longtime our stay with Betret International construction PLC as

intern has helped us to develop;

- Communication skill - Efficiency

- Team work - Performance quality

- Report writing skill - Job satisfaction

- On site work skills - Accuracy

- Punctuality etc…

We also worked hard so far to create value and apply our competence, motivation and work

skills to make a strong contribution to Addis-Adama Motor way Construction Company .

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 CHAPTER THREE
3. SPECIFIC JOB INFORMATION
The specific job information we have been working on each department are:

3.1 Site supervision

In our stay in this project, we have gained a lot of the knowledge and skill participating in all
activities with the help of our supervisor from entrance day up to end of internship. The main
activities we have learned in this site vision are:

3.1.1. Major activities in this road construction are;

 Clearing and grubbing of unnecessary materials i.e top soils

 Earth work including sub grade preparation
 Capping layer placing
 Culvert construction
 Site work quality control
 Material selection or road construction

3.1.2. Tests

 Identifying types of test conducting at site

 Identifying procedure of each test
 Carrying out test conducted

3.1.2.1. Laboratory test

 The main contractor conducts this test by itself at its main branch in Bushoftu and
sometimes in Addis Ababa, so we didn’t get chance to see this test.
a) Compaction test or proctor test

After compaction is done the density should a minimum of 95% of the maximum dry density
that brought in laboratory. These tests performed by using sand-cone equipment. It depend on
station.

- 1.65CBR for fill section

- 1.32CBR for road bed
- 1.59 CBR for cut section

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 b) California bearing ratio test
 Used to evaluate strength of the sub grade for the pavement thickness design
 Depend on the station it has different values.

3.1.2.2 Field test

We have seen how this test operated in the field. Some amount of soil is taken from each layer
to measure its density, using sand cone method test.

3.1.3. The activity performed daily

- Clay material placing

- Compaction
- Excavation of soft material
- Clay and Red ash soil material preparation
- Material mix
- Excavation of hard core
- Waste away

Fig 3.1 material mix (clay with red ash soil)

Fig 3.2 Red ash soil on the site

The main work carried out by Betret International Construction Company is construction road
up to capping layer

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3.2. LAYERS OF THE ROAD
3.2.1. Natural soil
On which the pavement structure is laid on, if the organic materials are in excess first
clearance of the site is necessary, first cleared, remove top soil and excavate the soil. Deep of
removing is from 15cm to 20cm.

Capping layer: Is the layer in which, if the sub grade materials used are and poor quality, so
capping layer which is cheap, but strong one is used to cap the weak sub grade, in this way, the
thickness of expensive sub grade is not required to be increased.

Used to strength the sub grade, but also protect the road formation during construction.

It protects the sub grade from weathering such as wetting, thickness 30cm by two 1ayers.

3.2.2. Sub grade

 Sub grade soil is an integral part of the road pavement structure.
 It should possess sufficient stability under adverse climate and loading conditions.
 The desirable properties of soil as a highway material are:
1. Stability
2. Incompressibility
3. Permanency of strength
4. Minimum changes in volume and stability under adverse conditions of weather and
ground water
5. Good drainage
6. Ease of compaction

From the main work carried out by this project, the sub grade takes the major part. Sub grade is
an integral part of the road pavement structure and it should possess sufficient stability under
adverse climate condition. The material used to construct it is different from station to station for
earth work and structural parts, this means different in type, quality proportionality and etc. And
also its depth varies from place to place; it very deep at gorge and small at normal ground level.
Its compaction performed for each 20cm thickness layer. The compaction intended to equipment
type, soil depth, soil type and number of travel under selected condition. It’s advised to light
after heavy, slow after fast. Always check the water content and density in order to achieve the
required degree of compaction requirements.

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Materials proportionality at different station:

1. For sub grade – selected soil.

2. For gorge – clay soil with water
3. For around structure - 5 red ash soil and 3 clay soil with water
4. For capping layer – 4 clay soil and 2 red ash soil

But if there is no required soil type, a crushed stone and soil is mixed proportionally with water
by grader to replace required material.

And also we take participation in the site how equipment operates the given work within given
time. The equipment in the operation was: loader, dozer, damp trucker, water trucker, excavator,
roller and etc.

3.2.3. Sub-base materials

Is the layer of aggregate material laid on the sub grade on which the base course layer is
located; it is main load bearing layer of the pavement. Its role is to spread the load evenly over
the sub grade.

Materials used; unbound granular materials such as crushed stone with sand.

Machineries used; compactor used to achieve the required depth of sub base.

 The sub-base is an important load-spreading layer that enables traffic stresses to be

reduced to acceptable levels on the sub grade.
 In dry climatic conditions, in areas of good drainage, and where the road surface remains
well-sealed, unsaturated moisture conditions prevail and sub-base specifications may be
relaxed.
 In wet climatic conditions, the most stringent requirements are dictated by the need to
support construction traffic and paving equipment
 A minimum CBR of 30 percent is required at the highest anticipated moisture content when
compacted to a minimum of 95 percent of the MDD achieved in the Heavy Compaction.
 A high quality sub-base is required where loading or climatic conditions during
construction are severe.
 For sub grade CBR values less than 5% and longitudinal gradients of greater than 6%, a
gravel wearing course is recommended.
 The selection of sub-base materials depends on the design function of the layer and the
anticipated moisture regime, both in service and at construction.

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 3.3.3: Base Course Materials
The layer of materials above the sub base course, that used to transfer the load of the vehicles to
the sub base.
 This material is produced by crushing fresh, quarried rock, or alternatively the material
may be separated by screening and recombined to produce a desired particle size
distribution, as per the specification.
 The main quality specification for a granular base course is the grain size distribution
requirements.
 For paver-laid materials, lower fines content may be accepted.

3.3. Technical knowledge and skills benefited from our course

I. High way I and II

 Determine thickness of each layer

 Selection of center line of the roads
 Mixing sub grade material in the site
 Construction of culvert which provides an opening under the road way.

II. Soil mechanics I and II

 To determine type and properties of soil

 To determine slope of embankment
 To determine water content and density of soil

III. Construction material

 Determine concrete mix ratio

IV. Foundation I

 Construction of retaining wall

 Footing

V. Construction Methods and Equipment

 Management of equipment
 Production of equipment

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 CHATER FOUR

4. EAVALUATION AND CRITIQUE

Every person may have his own career goal, but achieving these career goals depends on how
each person is closer to his/her goal. As our being a civil engineering students and the field is a
vast field, we weren’t even sure on which field we have to work whether building, construction,
water or highway. Through this internship program, our career goal become specific and comes
to our right decision to be what we want.

In this field, the real learning happens only when we do it by ourselves. Civil engineering
internships ensure that interns get to learn the basics by doing and assisting senior engineers on
real projects. It is a vital for all engineering field to see actual engineering processes, understand
the practice of the working on the site and the limitation. It also helps to learn new engineering
skills to outline academic qualification and working experiences. Practical experience gained
during the internship can be as importance as the grades in engineering courses. But with the
hands on training, we can learn how to apply theoretical knowledge to our surrounding
environment. For those who are eager to know design, construction and supervision of the real
civil engineering project, internship program is the best way to help students to change their
theoretical back ground they have in university to practical knowledge and also to work
effectively after graduation without frustration i.e. develop self confidence.

Student will pay attention and follow their day to day activities when the internship has value/
credit and the department supervisors check what the students are doing every month, not once
with in internship duration and the students have to report monthly what they did.

Hand calculation of projects whether it is building design, road design or other civil engineering
projects are time consuming and become impractical without the use of computer programs with
respect to time. Even though, we know the principles and ideas behind design and drawing, we
have to be familiar with computer programs.

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 Challenges and problems

During the internship program many challenges are faced to us, while performing our internship
program. These are:

1. Lack of transportation service to move from our house to the project site.
2. Shortage of the pocket money. The pocket money which is given by the university
is not enough for transportation and other service because all things are expensive
in this area.
3. On the first time of our internship program we have also lack of communication
skill with workers that mean lack of confidence.
4. To adapt the weather condition of the site of the project. Because around the site
there is bad weather condition.
5. Another is shortage of computer access to develop our computer skill.
6. The distance between their site and office of the project is so far; due to this, it is
difficult to perform our activities on site and in the office simultaneously.
7. It is difficult to gather different information or data at any time from surveyor, time
keeper, etc.
8. The main soil laboratory test of the project is located at Debre Zeit, so this is
difficult to participate in the soil test that performed by geotechnical engineer. This
is one of the main challenges.
9. It is difficult to be curious and critical-thinking; we had many questions to ask our
colleagues. At times, however, they were simply too busy to answer them, so we
had to wait. This delayed work.

Measures that we takes in order to solve some problems are:

 Solving the transportation and other service by asking the site manager and our
families to help us.
 By increasing our practical skills and confidence we have improved our
communication skills.

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 Conclusion

The internship has met most of the objectives, but its success was under our expectations.
Practically it has opened our eyes to working life, enlightened us socially, and matured us as an
adult to some extent. It has strengthened our technical base and enabled us to integrate theory
with engineering practice. Finally, it has given us a clear sense of direction in our future studies
and career as a civil engineer.

Recommendations

Host Company

Our training experience at Addis Ababa-Adama toll motor way road project has been so
satisfying that there is very little to complain about.
The company must give access of services and tests (i.e laboratory test and field test).

ASTU

We would like to recommend that the Civil Engineering Department to give software courses
such AutoCAD and Sap before internship and add some essential software like Eagle point and
Mx-Road to undergraduate curriculum.
Internship department must assign supervisors to the company where the interns are assigned
for helping and controlling them like other universities.

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References

ERA Manual

Site Engineer

Text Books

Handouts

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