Geotechnical Frontiers 2017 GSP 280 19

The Effect of Fiber Type and Size on the Strength and Ductility of Fly Ash and
Fiber Stabilized Fine-Grained Soil Subbase

Sazzad Bin-Shafique, Ph.D., P.E.1; Sanjoy Das Gupta2; Jie Huang, Ph.D., P.E., M.ASCE3;
and Sepehr Rezaeimalek, M.Sc., S.M.ASCE4
1
Professor, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Univ. of Texas at San Antonio,
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One UTSA Circle, San Antonio, Texas 78249; E-mail: sshafique@utsa.edu

2
Consolidated Reinforcement, Lp., Austin, Texas 78238.
3
Assistant Professor, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Univ. of Texas at San
Antonio, One UTSA Circle, San Antonio, Texas 78249; E-mail: jie.huang@utsa.edu
4
Ph.D. Candidate, Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, The Univ. of Texas at San
Antonio, One UTSA Circle, San Antonio, Texas 78249; E-mail: sepehr.rezaeimalek@utsa.edu

Abstract

This study investigates the effects of the type and size of randomly oriented polymeric fibers on
the strength and failure strain of fly ash stabilized high plasticity soil. Three different lengths of
13 mm, 25 mm, and 50 mm of two types of fibers, one with low (polypropylene) and the other
with high (polyethylene) tensile strength were mixed (1%) with high plasticity clay soil and
Class C fly ash (10%). The mixtures were compacted to prepare specimens for unconfined
compression test and split tensile test at the same dry unit weight. The fiber inclusions increased
the compressive and tensile strength of fly ash stabilized soils significantly. The 25 mm fiber
specimens with an aspect ratio of 0.45 that is the length of the fiber to the diameter of soil
specimen, showed the maximum enhancement of strength for both compressive and tensile
strength. Although all the specimens failed due to pullout of the fibers, the specimens with
different fiber showed different strains at failure. The 13 mm fiber specimens (aspect ratio of
0.22) showed minimum increase in failure strain, whereas the specimens prepared with 25 mm
and 50 mm fibers showed the maximum increase in failure strain, and failure did not occur even
at 15% strain. The length of fiber has a relatively lower impact on gaining strength, but has
pronounced effect on the ductility of the soil. The failure strain increased at least 132% when the
25 mm fiber was used. The polyethylene fiber stabilized soil showed slightly higher strengths
because of its higher tensile strength and elastic modulus.

INTRODUCTION

A variety of laboratory and field studies have shown that fly ashes (Class C) are very effective in
improving the geotechnical properties of fine-grained soils (Ferguson 1993; Misra 1994; Turner
1997; Edil et al. 2002; Prabakar et al. 2004; Parsons and Kneebone 2005; Senol et al. 2006;
Buhler and Cerato 2007). The fly ash stabilized soil is typically strong and stiff, and provides
necessary support as a structural component of the roadway (Misra 1994; Edil et al. 2002;
Parsons and Kneebone 2005). Moreover, the stabilization of high plasticity soils with fly ash
causes significant reduction of shrink-swell potential (Abduljauwad 1995; Cokca 2001;
Nalbantoglu and Gucbilmez 2002; Parsons and Milburn 2003; Phani Kumar and Sharma 2004;

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Punthutaecha et al. 2006; Buhler and Cerato 2007; Bin-Shafique et al. 2010). Despite all the
advantages, the use of fly ash is restricted primarily to low volume roads and sometimes in
stabilizing the fine-grained soils to prepare a working platform for the highway construction
equipment (Ferguson 1993; Nicholson and Kashyap 1993; Turner 1997) perhaps due to some
limitations. Fly ash stabilized soils are very brittle in nature (Bin-Shafique et al. 2004) and the
tensile strength of fly ash stabilized soil is much lower than the compressive strength, which
triggers concerns for tensile failure at the bottom of the subbase of a flexible pavement (Rahman
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2007).
From the analogy of improving soil strength due to presence of natural plant root
(Waldron 1977; Wu and Erb 1988; Ozkul and Baykal 2007; Mohamed 2013), similar
experimental studies were carried out by incorporating randomly oriented artificial fibers in
stabilized fine-grained soils with cementitious materials, such as lime and cement to understand
the influence of the fiber inclusions, which showed that the inclusion of randomly oriented
artificial fibers in stabilized fine-grained soils improves the strength and ductility (Kaniraj and
Havanagi 1999; Sobhan and Mashnad 2003; Kumar et al. 2007; Consoli et al., 2011; Olgun
2013; Tiwari and Ghiy 2013). Similar experimental studies were also conducted by
incorporating randomly oriented artificial fibers in fine-grained soils stabilized with self-
cemented Class C fly ash, which showed significant improvement of strength and ductility (Bin-
Shafique et al. 2010; Senol 2012, Senol et al. 2012). Inclusion of randomly oriented artificial
fibers in Class C fly ash stabilized expansive soils also reduces the shrink-swell potential
(Puppala et al. 2001; Rahman 2007; Yarbaşı et al. 2007; Bin-Shafique et al. 2010).
Although a number of studies were conducted to understand the optimum dosage of fiber
in the fly ash stabilized fined-grained soil, but a very few studies has been conducted to evaluate
the effect of fiber types and sizes on the strength and ductility of fly ash stabilized high plasticity
soil (Gupta 2014).
Thicker and stronger fibers might have more tensile strength, but the number of fibers
decreases compared to thinner fibers for a certain fiber content. Similarly, the number of fibers
also depends on the size of the fibers for certain fiber content. Thus, the dosage of fiber
recommended for optimum performance should be fiber-type and fiber-size specific (Gupta
2014). A few number of thicker fibers mixed randomly with fly ash and soil may not be
distributed uniformly along every failure plane compared to outnumbered great number of
thinner fibers and can provide less improvement (Gupta 2014). Although, the smaller fibers are
more suitable to mix with stabilized soil for less chance of entanglement, but the smaller fibers
may not provide enough bonding capacity to improve the strength and ductility of the stabilized
soil (Gupta 2014). The primary objective of this study is to evaluate the effect of fiber size and
fiber type on the strength and ductility of the randomly oriented fibers and fly ash stabilized high
plasticity soil. To achieve this objective, a high plasticity soil is stabilized with Class C fly ash
and two different types of fibers with three different lengths and was subjected to unconfined
compression and split tensile testing to evaluate the effect of fiber size and fiber type. Split
tensile test is a test sued to determine the tensile strength in which a cylindrical specimen is
loaded to failure in diametral compression that is applied along the entire length.

MATERIALS

The selected soil has 89% fines. The liquid limit and plasticity index of the soil is 52 and 21,
respectively, and the specific gravity is 2.7. The soil is classified as high plasticity clay (CH)
according to USCS and as A-7-6 with a group index (GI) of 57 according to AASHTO

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classification. The maximum dry unit weight (standard Proctor compaction) and optimum
moisture content of the soft soil is 16.2 kN/m3 and 20%, respectively. The sulfate content was
also measured and was insignificant.
Class C fly ash was collected from Boral Material Technologies in San Antonio, TX. The
total percentage of the three major metal oxides (SiO2, Al2O3 and Fe2O3) in the fly ash is 58.6 %
and the Sulfur Trioxide (SO3) is 2.2%, which satisfies the requirements of ASTM C 618 and
AASTHO M 298. The lime (CaO) content, which is primarily responsible for cementitious
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property of the fly ash, is 27.5% and has self-cementing properties. The specific gravity of the
fly ash is 2.71. The moisture content is 0.04% and the loss on ignition that represents unburned
carbon is 0.33%. To perform the test, two types of fibers were collected. One of them is a
polypropylene fiber and the other one is a polyethylene fiber (Figure 1).

(a) (b)
Figure 1. Picture of the fibers: (a) polypropylene fiber and (b) polyethylene fiber.

The discrete polypropylene fiber has a specific gravity of 0.91; the modulus of elasticity
is 4.13 GPa and the tensile strength of 0.28 GPa. It is used to increase the shear strength of soil.
This fiber will be denoted as “Black” fiber in the rest of the paper. The discrete polyethylene
fiber has a specific gravity of 0.92; the modulus of elasticity is of 50 GPa and the tensile strength
of 6 GPa. This fiber has an excellent acid, alkali and mildew resistance, which is used to
increase the flexural and tensile strength of concrete. This fiber will be denoted as “White” Fiber
in the rest of the paper. The tensile strength is approximately 20 times and the modulus of
elasticity approximately 12 times higher for White fibers than that of the Black fibers.
The White fibers are much thicker than the Black fibers because its intended purpose is to
increase the strength of concrete. The weight of one White fiber is approximately equivalent to
seven Black fibers. Thus the number of White fibers is seven times less than the Black fibers for
any particular fiber content. The pullout resistances of the fibers from compacted specimens
were measured using horizontal pull-meter, which is 71 N/m length of Black fiber and 249 N/m
length of White fiber.

METHODS

Specimen preparation. Specimens were prepared with the mixture of soil, fly ash, fiber, and
water. All specimens were compacted to 96% of the maximum dry unit weight (standard
Proctor) and 4% above the optimum moisture content. Fly ash contents of 10% (by weight)
along with the control (0% fly ash) and 1% fiber content (by weight) of two different fibers with
three different lengths (13 mm, 25 mm, and 50 mm) were used for soil stabilization as illustrated

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in Table 1. To prepare the mixture of a specimen, the required amount of soil, fly ash, and fiber
was calculated from the target dry unit weight and the volume of the specimen. All soil lumps
were broken and sieved through a US #4 sieve. The required amount of soil, fly ash, and fiber
was taken in a tray and was mixed in a dry state. After thoroughly mixing, the required amount
of water was added to the mixture. All mixing was done manually and proper care was taken to
prepare homogenous mixture at each stage of mixing. As soon as the mixture was ready, it was
transferred to a mold and compacted statically in a load cell until it achieved the target volume.
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Thick-wall 56-mm diameter PVC pipes were cut into 113 mm long pieces. The pieces of
pipes were split and clamped together to use as molds to prepare the specimens for the
unconfined compression tests. To compact all the specimens prepared with stabilized soil, a very
thin layer of petroleum jelly was applied inside the molds to minimize skin friction and boundary
effect during compaction. The load cell was programmed in such a way so that it would compact
the specimen exactly 100 mm. Similarly, 75-mm diameter PVC pipes were used to prepare the
specimens for split tensile tests. Three replicates for each combination of stabilized soil shown
in Table 1 were prepared for unconfined compression test and split tensile strength test. After
the compaction, the specimens were taken out of the split molds and were wrapped with plastic
wrap to allow them to cure for 7days in a moist condition. Seven days of curing allows the
specimens to reach peak strength and is a common practice. After curing, the specimens were
subjected to testing.

Table 1. Mixing schedules for unconfined compression and split tensile test.
Type of Fly Ash Fiber Length Type of Flash Ash Fiber Length
Fiber Content (0%) (mm) Fiber Content (0%) (mm)
0 0
Black 13 White 13
0 or 10% 0 or 10%
Fiber 25 Fiber 25
50 50

Test procedures. Unconfined compression tests were conducted according to ASTM D 2166. A
constant axial strain of 2%/min was applied. Loading was continued until the load decreased
with increasing strain, or until 15% strain was reached. The unconfined compressive strengths
were determined from the stress-strain curves.
The split tensile tests were conducted according to the procedures outlined in ASTM C
496. The procedure for split tensile test for concrete was slightly modified for the soil as
described in Sobhan and Mashnad (2003). A thin steel bearing plate was used to distribute the
applied load along the length of the cylindrical specimens.

RESULTS

Effects on compressive strength. The stress-strain diagrams of the soil stabilized with both fly
ash and fibers are shown in Figure 2 along with the stress-strain diagram of the soil alone, and
soil stabilized with only fly ash. The stress-strain diagrams show that the addition of fiber with
fly ash increased the strength for both type of fibers. Usually soil stabilized only with fly ash is
very brittle and the specimens fail suddenly at a strain less than 3%. However, soil stabilized
with fly ash-fiber shows ductile behavior and most of the cases do not completely fail even after
15% strain. The maximum enhancement on the compressive strength occurs when the soil is
stabilized with 25 mm long fibers for both Black and White fibers. It is noteworthy that

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compared with the fly ash stabilized soil the modulus of elasticity remains similar even after
adding fibers. This phenomenon is understandable as the fiber only starts to show effect after
yielding.

800
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600
Stress (kPa)

400 Soil Alone

Soil + 10% FA
Soil + 10% FA + 0.5" FI
Soil + 10% FA + 1" FI
200 Soil + 10% FA + 2" FI

0
0 3 6 9 12 15
Axial Strain (%)
(a)
1000

800
Stress (kPa)

600

Soil Alone
400 Soil + 10% FA
Soil + 10% FA + 0.5" FI
Soil + 10% FA + 1" FI
200 Soil + 10% FA + 2" FI

0
0 3 6 9 12 15
Axial Strain (%)
(b)

Figure 2. Stress–strain curves of stabilized soil: (a) black fiber and (b) white fiber.

Effect on peak compressive strength. The effect of fiber size and fiber type on the peak
compressive strength of soil stabilized with fly ash and fiber is shown in Figure 3. The peak
compressive strength of the soil stabilized only with Black fiber increases slightly as the fiber
length is increased to 25 mm and remains same as the fiber length increased from 25 mm to
50 mm. For White fiber, the peak compressive strength increases slightly as the fiber length is
increased to 25 mm and then decreases as the fiber length increased from 25 mm to 50 mm. The
addition of fly ash increased the peak strength significantly, but the effect of fiber size follows
the same trend for both types of fibers.

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1000

800

Peak Strength (kPa)

600 Soil + Black FI
Soil + FA + Black FI
Soil + White FI
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400 Soil + FA + White FI

200

0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Fiber Length (mm)

Figure 3. Effect of fiber size on peak compressive strength of soil stabilized with fiber and
fly ash-fiber.

The diameter and the height of the unconfined compression test specimens are 56 mm
and 113 mm, respectively. The aspect ratios of the fiber, i.e., fiber length to specimen diameter,
are 0.22 for 13 mm fiber, 0.44 for 25 mm fiber, and 0.89 for 50 mm fiber. As reported by Tang
et al (2007), the compressive strength of fiber stabilized soil is the maximum when the aspect
ratio of the fiber with the minimum dimension of the specimen varies between 0.4 and 0.6.
Similar findings were observed for fly ash-fiber stabilized soil. For lower aspect ratio, such as
0.22, the stabilized soil fails usually for low pullout resistance and for higher aspect ratio such as
0.89, some parts of the fibers have the possibility to remains outside of the specimen and can
show boundary effect (Tang et al. 2007; Babu and Vasudevan 2008). The White fiber increased
the peak compressive strength of stabilized soils compared to Black fiber perhaps due to higher
modulus of elasticity, higher tensile strength, and higher pullout resistance of the fiber.

Effect on peak strain. The effect of fiber size on peak strain of soil stabilized with fiber and fly
ash-fiber is shown in Figure 4. The peak strain increases as the length of the fiber increases from
0 to 25 mm and then remains similar as the length of the fiber increases from 25 mm to 50 mm.
For Black fiber, the peak strain increased from 1.9% to 4% for 13 mm fiber, but the stress
increased up to 15% strain (as the test were continued) for 25 mm and 50 mm fiber. For 13 mm
fiber, the stress decreases slightly after the peak (as shown in Figure 2a) perhaps due to pullout
failure for some of the fibers in the failure plane.
Similarly, for White fiber, the peak strain increased from 1.9% to 4.4% as the fiber length
increases from 0 to 25 mm. The peak strain decreases slightly as the fiber length increases from
25 mm to 50 mm. For all sizes of White fiber, the stress decreases slightly after the peak (as
shown in Figure 2b). The slight decrease of the stress after peak for 13 mm fiber is perhaps due
to pullout failure for some of the fibers in the failure plane (Babu and Vasudevan 2008).

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20

Black FI
15 White FI

Peak Strain (%)

10
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0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Fiber Length (mm)

Figure 4. Effect of fiber size on peak strain of soil stabilized with fiber and fly ash.

Effect on tensile strength. The results of the split tensile tests are shown in Table 2. While the
specimens prepared from soil alone and soil with only fly ash split completely, most of the fiber
stabilized soils did not split completely except for 13 mm fibers specimens prepared with both
Black and White fibers. The test was stopped as soon as a clear crack was found and the tensile
strength was calculated. Similar to compressive strength tests, the increase in tensile strength
were highest when the soil is stabilizes with 25 mm fiber. The fiber inclusion increased the
tensile strength as much as 80% when the soil was stabilized with Black fibers and 70% when
the soil was stabilized with White fibers.

Table 2. Split tensile test results.

Fly Ash Tensile Strength (kPa)
Fiber Length
Content
(mm) Black Fiber White Fiber
(%)
0 70.4 (4.1) 70.4 (4.1)
13 95.5 (11.9) 113.2 (38.4)
0
25 113.2 (6.0) 128.8 (9.3)
50 125.7 (5.6) 115.4 (28.6)
0 188.7 (4.7) 188.7 (4.7)
13 255.3 (18.2) 281.9 (3.1)
10
25 341.0 (35.1) 324.1 (34.8)
50 254.2 (21.8) 319.7 (4.4)
Note: the number in the parenthesis is the standard deviation.

The failure patterns of the split tensile tests for soils stabilized with different sizes of
fibers are shown in Figure 5. The specimens prepared with 25 mm and 50 mm fibers did not
split completely similar to the specimens prepared with no fiber and 13 mm fibers. Apparently it
seems that the crack originated in the brittle stabilized soil part, but the fibers are still intact.
Since the split tensile test was introduced for brittle material, such as concrete, one of the
drawbacks of the split tensile tests is its inability to capture the effect of ductility as it does not
provide any stress-strain diagram. Thus, the tensile strength obtained from the specimens
prepared with 25 mm and 50 mm fiber may not represent the actual tensile strength.

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(a) (b) (c)

Figure 5. Failure pattern of split tensile test specimens: (a) no fiber (b) 13 mm long fibers
and (c) 25 mm long fibers.

The effect of fiber size and type on the tensile strength of soil stabilized with fly ash and
fiber is shown in Figure 6. The tensile strength of the soil stabilized with both fibers increases as
the fiber length is increased from 0 to 25 mm. The tensile strength remains same for Black fibers
and decreases slightly as the fiber length increased from 25 mm to 50 mm.

400

300
Tensile Strength (kPa)

Soil + Black FI
Soil + FA + Black FI
200 Soil + White FI
Soil + FA + White FI

100

0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Fiber Length (mm)

Figure 6. Effect of fiber size on tensile strength of stabilized soil.

The diameter and the height of the split tensile test specimens are 69 mm and 138 mm,
respectively. The aspect ratios of the fiber with the minimum dimension of the specimens are
0.18 for 13 mm fiber, 0.36 for 25 mm fiber, and 0.72 for 50 mm fiber. For lower aspect ratio,
such as 0.18, the stabilized soil fails usually for low pullout resistance. For higher aspect ratio
such as 0.72, some parts of the fibers have the possibility to remains outside of the specimen to
impose boundary effect (Tang et al. (2007); Babu and Vasudevan (2008)). At higher aspect ratio
such as 0.72, the White fiber is quite difficult to uniformly blend with the soil, which might be
the reason for slightly lower tensile strength.
For 25 mm White fiber, where the number of fibers are two times higher than the 50 mm
fiber, the effect of blending and boundary effect become less significant and the White fiber
shows higher tensile strength of stabilized soils compared to Black fiber perhaps due to higher
modulus of elasticity and higher tensile strength of the fiber. For all the tests conducted in this
study, no rupture was observed, which meant the specimens failed due to the fiber pullout.

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CONCLUSIONS

The fiber inclusions increased the peak compressive strength of fly ash stabilized soils as much
as 30% for polypropylene (black) fibers and 50% for polyethylene (white) fibers. The strength
of soil increases as the fiber length was increased from 0 to 25 mm, and then remains the same
for Black fibers and decreases slightly for White fibers as the fiber length was increased from 25
to 50 mm. The 25 mm fiber specimens, which has an aspect ratio between the fiber lengths and
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the minimum dimension of the specimen of 0.44, showed the maximum enhancement of strength
for both compressive and tensile strength.
The 12 mm fiber specimen, which has an aspect ratio between the fiber length and the
minimum dimension of the specimen of 0.22, showed minimum increase in failure strain and the
failure occurred due to pullout of the fibers, whereas the 25 mm fiber (aspect ratio of 0.44) and
50 mm fiber (aspect ratio of 0.89) specimens showed the maximum increase in failure strain, and
failure did not occur even at 15% strain. The length of fiber has a relatively lower impact on
gaining strength, but has pronounced effect on failure strength or the ductility of the soil, which
is usually severely compromised due to fly ash stabilization of high plasticity soil. The failure
strain increased at least 132% when the 25 mm fiber was used.
The fiber increased the tensile strength of fly ash stabilized soils as much as 70% for
Black fibers and 80% for White fibers. Similar to the compressive strength, the tensile strength
of soil increased as the fiber length was increased from 0 to 25 mm, and then remains the same
for Black fibers and decreases slightly for White fibers at a fiber length of 50 mm. The 25 mm
fiber specimens (aspect ratio 0.36) showed the maximum enhancement of tensile strength for
both types of fibers.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors would like to thank the DeHanis Brick and Tile Company, TX, the Fiber Soils,
Baton Rouge, LA, the Euclid Chemical Company, OH, and the Boral Materials, TX, for
providing the soil, polypropylene fibers, the polyethylene fibers, and the fly ash, respectively.

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