Chapter – Five

Earth Work

Highway Engineering-I
Chair of Infrastructure Design and Construction,
EiABC
Earth work and Mass Haul Diagram
❑Earth Work: is a term related with process of determining volume of
cut and fill and its cost.
Terms related with Earth work
▪ Cross section
▪ Earth work Volume (excavation and embankment)
▪ Shrinkage factor
▪ Swell factor

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 Earth work…
❑Cross section: is section drawing taken in traverse direction to the
proposed road alignment.
Cross sections are used to determine the Area of fill and cut at a given
station.
Types of sections
▪ Level section
▪ Two level section
▪ Tree level section
▪ Side hill two level section
▪ Multi level section

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 Level Section Two Level Section Three Level Section

Side hill two level section (cl in fill section) Side hill two Level section (cl in cut section) Multi Level Section 4
 Area Calculation
❑ Level Section: A = (b +s h) h

❑ Two Level Section: A = S*h1h2 + 2[h1 + h2]

𝑏 𝑏2
❑ Three Level Section: A = [(d1 + d2)*( +ℎ )] -
4𝑠 2 4𝑠

❑ Side Hill two level sections

(𝒃 +𝒏𝒉)𝟐 (𝒃 −𝒏𝒉)𝟐
𝟏 𝟏
▪ Center line of road within Cut section: A c = 𝟐[ 𝟐
𝒏−𝒔
], Af = 𝟐[ 𝟐
𝒏−𝒔
]

𝟏 (𝒘𝟏)𝟐 𝟏 (𝒘𝟐) 𝟐
▪ Center line of road within Fill section: Ac = (
𝟐 𝒏−𝒔
), Af = (
𝟐 𝒏−𝒔

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 Earthwork…
❑Quantity (Volume)
Excavation: The amount of material that needs to be removed from the
grade.
Embankment: The amount of material that needs to be added to the
grade as a fill.
▪ Volume of Excavation and embankment is calculated from Area of
cross section using the average end area method.

Note: Please refer your course of Surveying to revise how to calculate

the area of cross section.

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Earthwork…
❑ Volume calculation (End area Method)
▪ The area between the existing ground and design road
profile is calculated at each cross-section.
▪ Determine the average area between two consecutive
cross- sections.
▪ This area is multiplied by the distance between two cross-
sections.

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Earthwork…
Three States of Material volume
▪ Bank (Un disturbed soil or naturally existing soil)
▪ Loose ( excavated and swelled soil)
▪ Compacted (soil after compaction or shrinked soil)

Shrinkage factor: is a factor considered to adjust volume of fill material to

balance volume reduction due to compaction.
• Mostly 15% to 20%

Swell factor: is a factor related with volume increment on excavated material

to consider effect of swelling of soil after excavation.
• Ranges: 25% - 30% or more
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❑ Mass haul Diagram
• Mass haul diagram is a graph of cumulative sum of volume of earth
work versus station where, Cumulative sum of volume is drawn on
the vertical (Y-axis) and station is drawn on horizontal (X-axis).

• Rising mass diagram indicates section of excavation.

• Falling mass diagram shows section of fill/embankment work.

• Relative maximum/minimum points on mass haul diagram indicate

station at which earth work changes from cut to fill or vis versa or
zero values on profile drawing.

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Mass Haul diagram…

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Special Terms related with mass hauling
❑Balance line: Any horizontal line that intersects the mass haul diagram twice and
which equalizes cut and fill volume in a given range of distance.

❑Free haul distance (FHD): Agreed horizontal distance over which material will be
transported without additional transportation fee.

❑Over haul distance (OHD): a distance beyond free haul distance for which the
contractor will be paid for transporting materials. i.e. there is no limit for over
haul distance as long as it is economical.

❑Economical hauling distance (EHD): maximum distance beyond which it is

economical to use borrow material than transporting excavated material to be
used as fill material on fill section.
Where,
𝑪𝒃 EHD: Economical hauling distance
EHD ≤ + FHD Cb: Cost of borrow material (ETB/m3)
𝑪𝒐𝒉 Coh: cost of over hauling (ETB/m3*Station or ETB/m3*Km)
FHD: Free haul distance
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Special Terms….
❑Free haul volume: Total volume of material that is hauled without
transportation fee.
❑Overhaul volume: volume of material that is hauled with
transportation fee.
❑Borrow: Volume of embankment material imported from borrow
source in case of excess fill or uneconomical transportation cost of
excavated material.
❑Waste: Amount of excavated material that will be thrown away due
to either excess excavation or poor excavated material quality.

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Steps in drawing mass haul diagram
1. Determine area of fill/cut for a given cross section per station.
2. Determine volume of fill/cut for every station by using end area
method except for 0+000 station.
3. Adjust volume of fill and cut for shrinkage and swell.
4. Determine sum of volume of fill & cut at every station.
5. Determine cumulative sum of fill and cut for the whole station.
6. Draw profile diagram by plotting sum of fill and cut volume (not
cumulative) on vertical (Y-axis) and station on horizontal (X-axis).
7. Draw mass haul diagram under profile diagram by plotting
cumulative sum of volume of fill and cut on the vertical (Y-axis) and
station on horizontal (X-axis). 13
 Exercise
A road is proposed to be constructed on the rural section where west damping site is available
within 500m range on every section of the project area. On the contact agreement it is stated that
transporting material for a distance not greater than 200m is not payable. Assuming that excavated
material is good enough to be used as fill material throughout the project zone and shrinkage value
of fill material during compaction is 20%,
Determine the following based on the given data.
1. Draw profile and mass haul diagram.
2. Determine economical hauling distance (EHD).
3. Volume of free haul, over haul, borrow & west.
4. Total cost of earth work.

Note: Cex = 90 ETB/m3

Coh =0.5 ETB/m3/station
Cb = 200 ETB/m3

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Station Cut Fill Adj. F+C Cumulative
volume Volume fill volume sum

0+000 1,200
0+050 1,350
0+100 1,100
0+150 900
0+200 850 150
0+250 200 950
0+300 1,050
0+350 1,250
0+400 1,100
0+450 1,200
0+500 1,050
0+550 500 1,000
0+600 950 300
0+650 1,250
0+700 1,150
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0+750 1,450