Study on Strength Characteristics of Expansive Soil by Adding Vitrified Tile Sludge

Abstract

            Due to the rapid, urban and industrial development in the society, the construction of highways, embankments and many other engineering structures. The existing site may or may not be sufficiently strong enough to withstand the load coming over it. In order to overcome this problem, ground improvement techniques such as soil stabilization, soil reinforcing techniques, etc. have evolved which have now emerged as a part of the civil engineering practice. In this connection, Mechanical Stabilization of soil proves to be cost effective and reliable. As a property of clayey soil proves to be suitable for mechanical stabilization.

Expansive soils present significant geotechnical and structural engineering challenges the world over, with costs associated with expansive behavior estimated to run in to several billion annually. Expansive soils are soils that experience significant volume change associated with changes in water content that means it is volumetrically unstable due to seasonal moisture variation. Its strength decreases and compressibility increases tremendously on wetting. By keeping the above problem the cohesive nature clayey soil was chosen and checked for compaction properties along with other general soil characteristics by varying the content of vitrified tile sludge. From the present study it deduced that there is a significant decrease in compressibility characteristics of the clay with increase in vitrified tile sludge content as a result of gradual reaction in Atterburg’s limits. The results obtained are reliable with vitrified tile sludge replacement of original clayey soil. Ultimately, the composite soil with certain vitrified tile sludge content proves to be good construction material for complex civil engineering structures such as embankment, earthen dams, and runways.