SOIL MECHANICS IB-EECQ 3271

BACHELOR OF ENGINEERING IN CIVIL

ENGINEERING

Dr. George Okwadha

 Soil Stabilization
• Soil stabilization is the procedure employed with an aim of altering
one or more properties of a soil so as to improve its engineering
performance
• Some of the engineering performance abilities of a soil include
– Bearing capacity
– Volumetric stability
– Durability
• When an unsatisfactory soil is encountered, the following measures
may be made:
– Bypass the bad soil (e.g. use piles or divert the road)
– Remove the bad soil and replace it with a good one
– Redesign the structure (e.g. a raft foundation on a clay soil)
– Treat (or use additives) the soil to improve its properties
• The ultimate goal is to increase strength and stability of the soil i.e.
reduce sensitivity to moisture changes causing volumetric instability
 Methods or types of soil stabilization
• Soil stabilization procedures may be done by the following
methods
– Stabilization without additives
– Stabilization with additives
• Stabilization of soil without additives
– Soil stabilization without additives may be
• Mechanical –rearrangement of particles through compaction or additional or removal
of soil particles
• Drainage – achieving drainage through addition of external load by pumping,
electro-osmosis, application of a thermal gradient either heating or cooling
– Comparative laboratory tests followed by field tests should be used to
select the most economical method to solve the immediate problem
– Mechanical stabilization – involves improvement of soil properties by
rearrangement of particles and densification by compaction or by
changing the gradation through addition or removal of soil particles
 Mechanical stabilization
• Rearrangement of particles – Compaction
– This is the oldest and the most widely used method
– Augments other stabilization methods
– The moisture content, compactive effort and compaction type are
the variables involved
– The most desirable combination of placement variables depends
upon the nature of the soil and the desired properties
• Change of gradation – addition or removal of soil particles
– The engineering behavior of a soil depends upon
• The grain size distribution
• The composition of the particles
– Soil properties may be significantly altered by addition of soil of
some selected grain sizes and or by removing some selected
fraction of the soil
 Mechanical stabilization Cont’
• Change of gradation – addition or removal of soil particles
– Soil factions are manipulated to obtain a suitable grading by
mixing gravel, sand, silt and clay in proper proportions so that a
compaction of the mixture gives maximum density and strength
– The interaction of the soil particles and the binder determine the
physical properties of the compacted stabilized soil
– The optimum amount of binder is reached when the binder fills the
voids without destroying the grain-to-grain contacts of the coarse
particles
– The soil blended in this way is improved from either being purely
cohesive (clays, c-soil) or purely granular (sands and silts, ϕ-soil)
or cohesive-granular soils (gravels, c- ϕ soil)
 Mechanical stabilization Cont’
• Stabilization by drainage
– The strength of a soil decreases with an increase in pore water
pressure
– Addition of water to a clay soil reduces cohesion by increasing the
electric repulsion between the particles
– The strength of a saturated soil depends directly on the effective or
intergranular stress
– For a given total stress, an increase in pore water pressure results in a
decrease in effective stress and consequent decrease in strength
– Drainage methods include
• Application of external load-squeezes out pore water
• Drainage of pore water pressure using gravity and/or pumping using well-
points, sand drains (vertical sand drains or sand piles)
• Application of an electric gradient or electro-osmosis – temp decreases
electric repulsion
• Application of thermal gradient
 Soil stabilization with additives
• A very common method
• The mode and degree of alteration necessary depends on the
nature of the soil (clays, gravels etc) and its deficiencies
• If the strength is the deficit
– Cohesionless soil - add a cementitious or binding agent
– Cohesive soil –
• make moisture resistant
• increase cohesion with a cementitious agent
• Add internal friction
• If volumetric stability is a deficit
– Cohesionless soil – bind the particles with an agent
– Cohesive soil –
• Reduce volumetric instability by cementing grains with a rigid material
• Reduce shrinkage and swell by cementing , altering water adsorbing capacity and
making clay water resistant
 Soil stabilization with additives
• Permeability of a cohesionless material may be reduced by
filling the voids with an impervious material
– Improve permeability of cohesioless soil by removing the fines or
flocculating the grains
• Chemical stabilization - Uses a chemical as a primary agent
– Cement stabilization – done on granular (cohesionless) soils to
• Increase plasticity
• Increase strength
– Lime stabilization – done on fine-grained (cohesive) soils to
• Reduce plasticity
• Reduce volumetric instability or increase volumetric stability
• Increase strength
– Bitumen Stabilization
• Bituminous materials such as asphalts and tars may be used to stabilize
granular materials
 Soil stabilization with additives
• Bitumen Stabilization cont’
• Asphalts are natural materials or refined petroleum
products
• Tars are bituminous condensates produced by the
destructive distillation of organic materials such as
coal, oil, lignite and wood
• Most bitumen stabilization uses asphalts
• Bitumen stabilizes the soil by
– Binding soil particles together
– Waterproofing the soil and protecting it from
deleterious effects of water.
 Lateral Earth Pressures
• Lateral earth pressure is the force exerted by the soil mass upon an
earth-retaining structure such as a retaining wall
• There are three distinct kinds of earth pressures namely:
– Active earth pressure
– Passive earth pressure
– Earth Pressure at rest
• Active earth pressure
– Consider a retaining wall with a vertical back supporting a
cohesionless soil with a horizontal surface (see figure below)
– Let the angle of shearing resistance of the soil be ϕ and its unit wt.
γ be of a constant value
– Vertical stress acting at a point at depth h below the top of the wall
be given by
• σv = γh
 Active earth pressure
Retained Soil

Push

• If the soil retained by the wall exerts a push against the wall by virtue of its
tendency to slip laterally and seek its natural slope or angle of repose,
• the wall will move slightly away from the backfilled soil mass, making the
soil to expand causing an immediate reduction in the value of lateral pressure
at depth h.
• This kind of pressure is called active earth pressure of the soil
• The movement of the structure causes stains in the soil mass which in turn
mobilize shearing stresses which help to support the soil mass and
consequently reduce the pressure exerted by the soil against the structure
 Passive earth pressure
• If the wall is pushed slightly into the retained soil, the soil will tend to
be compressed
• There will be an increase in the value of the lateral pressure
• This kind of pressure is called Passive earth pressure
• The surface over which the sheared-off soil wedge to slide is referred
to as the surface of sliding or rupture
• When the structure is pushed against the soil, internal shearing
stresses develop but act in the opposite direction to those in the active
earth pressure and must be overcomed by the movement of the
structure
• The limiting values of both active and passive earth pressure or
resistance for a given soil depends on the amount of movement of the
structure
• This difference in the direction of internal stresses accounts for the
difference in magnitude between active and passive earth pressures
 Active and Passive Earth Pressures

(a) Active earth pressure conditions (b) Passive earth pressure conditions

• The narrative above indicates that there are two possible modes
of failure that can occur with the soil mass
• If the value of the vertical pressure remain as σv = γh during
these movements, then the minimum and maximum lateral earth
pressures that will be exerted can be obtained from the Mohr circle
diagram as shown
 Active and Passive Earth Pressures
• The lateral earth pressure can
τ
reduce to a minimum value at
which the stress circle is
tangential to the shear strength 𝝈𝟑𝒑
envelope of the soil. 𝝈𝟑𝒂 𝝈𝟏𝒂 𝝈𝟏𝒑
• This minimum value is known
as the active earth pressure
given by
• 𝒑𝒂 = 𝑲𝒂 γh where Ka is the
coeff. of Active earth Press. • When considering active pressure,
• The lateral earth pressure can the vertical pressure due to self-wt
rise to a maximum value is the major principal stress
known as the Passive Earth • And when considering passive
Pressure given by pressure, the vertical pressure due
• 𝒑𝒑 = 𝑲𝒑 γh where Kp is the to self-wt (𝝈𝒗 = 𝛄𝐡) is the minor
coeff. of passive earth Press. principal stress
 Active Pressure in cohesionless soils
• This can be estimated using Coulomb theory (1776) and
Rankine’s theory (1857)
 Rankine’s theory (Soil Surface horizontal)
• Assumptions are
– The soil mass is semi infinite, homogeneous, dry and cohesionless
– The ground surface is a plane which may be horizontal or inclined
– The face of wall in contact with the backfill is vertical and smooth.
That is, the friction, δ between the wall and the backfill is
neglected
– The wall yields back about the base sufficiently towards the fill for
the active pressure condition to develop and pushed sufficiently
towards the fill for the passive resistance to be fully mobilized
• Consider a smooth, vertical retaining wall holding back a
cohesioless soil with an angle of internal friction ϕ.
• The top of the soil is horizontal and level with the top of the wall
• Consider a point in the soil at a depth h below the top of the wall
assuming that the wall has yielded back sufficiently to satisfy
active earth pressure conditions
 Rankine’s theory (surface horizontal cont’)
• In the Mohr circle diagram
shown,
𝜎3 𝑂𝐴 𝑂𝐶−𝐴𝐶 𝑂𝐶−𝐷𝐶
• = = =
𝜎1 𝑂𝐵 𝑂𝐶+𝐶𝐵 𝑂𝐶+𝐷𝐶
• OCcos(90-ϕ)=DC
• But Cos(90-ϕ) = cos90Cosϕ+Sin90sinϕ)
• Cos90=0, sin90=1 ⇒ Cos (90-ϕ) = Sinϕ

𝐷𝐶
1−𝑂𝐶 1−𝑆𝑖𝑛ϕ
• 𝐷𝐶 = =𝐾𝑎
1+𝑂𝐶 1+𝑆𝑖𝑛ϕ

• It can be shown by trigonometry

that
1−𝑆𝑖𝑛ϕ ϕ
• =𝐾𝑎 =𝑡𝑎𝑛2 (45𝑜 − )
1+𝑆𝑖𝑛ϕ 2
• And active pressure
𝑝𝑎 = 𝐾𝑎 γℎ
 Rankine’s theory (surface horizontal cont’)
• Active pressure distribution at the back of the wall is
shown and the resultant thrust is given by
2
ℎ ℎ
𝑃𝑎 = 𝑝𝑎 = 𝐾𝑎 γ
2 2

pa
 Rankine’s theory (surface sloping at angle β)
• In this case, the vertical pressure will no longer be principal
stress since pressure on the wall is assumed to act parallel to
the surface of the wall i.e. at angle β to the horizontal
• The active pressure , pa is still the same and given by
𝑝𝑎 = 𝐾𝑎 γℎ
𝑐𝑜𝑠𝛽− 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2 β−𝑐𝑜𝑠 2 ϕ ℎ ℎ2
• Where 𝐾𝑎 = 𝐶𝑜𝑠𝛽 and 𝑃𝑎 = 𝑝𝑎 = 𝐾𝑎 γ
𝑐𝑜𝑠β+ 𝑐𝑜𝑠 2 β−𝑐𝑜𝑠 2 ϕ 2 2
 Example 1

Since pa = Kaγh
Pa,
𝒉
𝑷𝒂 = 𝒑𝒂
𝟐
Example 1 Cont’

That is, 159-64 = 95kN

 Coulomb’s Wedge Theory
• Coulomb’s theory considers the soil behind the wall as a
whole instead as an element in the soil (Rankine’s theory)
• If a wall supporting a granular soil were not to be there, the
soil will slump down to its angle of internal friction, ϕ
• If a wall therefore moves forward slightly, a rupture plane
BD would develop somewhere between AB and BC i.e.
between the wall and the surface of repose
• The triangular mass of soil between this plane of failure and
the back of the wall is referred to as the ‘sliding wedge’
(ABD).
• If the retaining wall were suddenly removed, the soil
within the sliding wedge would slump downward
 Coulomb’s Wedge Theory
• From the analysis of the forces acting on the wedge at
incipient failure, the thrust from the lateral earth pressure
necessary for the wall to withstand in order to hold the soil
mass in place would be obtained. Hence, referring
Coulomb’s theory as “Wedge theory”
 Coulomb’s Wedge Theory Assumptions
• The backfill is dry, homogeneous, and isotropic
• The backfill is elastically undeformable but breakable, granular
material processing internal friction but no cohesion
• The rupture surface is assumed to be plane and passes through the
heel of the wall
• The position and direction of the earth thrust are assumed to be known
and acts at the back of the wall at a point one-third of the height of the
wall above the base of the wall and makes an angle δ with the normal
of the face of the wall. The angle δ is the angle of friction between the
wall and backfill soil and is usually called wall friction
• The sliding wedge acts as a rigid body and the value of the earths
thrust is obtained by considering its equilibrium
• The earth thrust is solved on the basis of a 2-D case of plane strain.
That is, the retaining wall is assumed to be of infinite length and all
conditions of the wall and the fill remain constant along the length of
the wall. Thus a unit length of the wall is considered
 Coulomb’s wedge theory
• According to Coulomb,
 Coulomb’s wedge theory
See figure above

• The value of wall friction can be obtained from tests. However,

if tests are not available, assume δ to be 0.5 to 0.75ϕ.
 Example 2
• Using Coulomb’s wedge theory, determine the total active thrust on a
vertical retaining wall 5m high if the soil retained has a horizontal
surface level with the top of the wall and has the following properties:
ϕ′ = 35𝑜 , 𝛾 = 19𝑘𝑁𝑚−3 𝑎𝑛𝑑 δ = 0.5ϕ′
Example 2 Cont’
 Point of application of the total active thrust
• With either Rankine or Coulomb analytical methods, the
total active thrust, Pa is given by
𝐻 1
– 𝑃𝑎 = 𝑝𝑎 = 𝛾𝐻 2 𝐾𝑎 where Ka is the coeff. of active
2 2
earth pressure, H is the height of the wall and γ is the unit
weight of the soil
• The position of the centre of pressure on the wall is
indeterminate, however locations suitable for design
purposes are given in the figure below, and are based on the
Rankine’s theory with its assumption of triangular
distribution of pressure.
• The locations of Pa can also be used with values from
Coulombs theory.
 Point of application of the total active thrust

• The Pa obtained from the Culmann line construction is

assumed to be located where a line drawn through the
centroid of the failure wedge and parallel to the failure
plane intersects the back of the wall.
 End

Thank you