UNIVERSITY OF PERADENIYA

Faculty of Engineering

Postgraduate Programme in Geotechnical Engineering & Engineering Geology

END OF SEMESTER EXAMINATION – DECEMBER 2018

CE 656 Problematic Soils and Ground Improvement

(Two Hours)

(Answer ALL THREE questions. The distribution of marks within a question is given in
parenthesis)
_____________________________________________________________________

1) Part 1– Problematic Soil

(a) Briefly expalin two ground improvement techniques that can be used to improve a deep
collapsible soil deposit succeptible to wetting. (10% marks)
(b) An expansive soil deposit has an active zone thickness of 5.5 m below the ground surface. A
strip footing of width B = 2.0 m is to be constructed at a depth 𝐷𝑓 = 1.0 m below the ground
surface imposing a foundation pressure (q) of 160 kPa. Unit weight of clay is
19 kN/m3. A swell pressure test conducted on an undisturbed soil sample of thickness
20 mm gave the following results (Table Q1).
Table Q1
Thickness (mm) Swell Pressure (kPa)

Loading 20.0 170

20.5 125

21.1 75
Unloading
21.9 35

23.0 0

The vertical stress increase in a strip footing below the foundation (∆𝜎𝑧 ) due to foundation
load can be determined using the following formula;
2.60

1
∆𝜎𝑧 = 1 − (𝑞 − 𝑞0 )
𝐵 2
1 + (2𝑧 )
𝑓
[ ( ) ]
where B is width of foundation, 𝒛𝒇 is depth from the bottom of the foundation to the point, q
is foundation pressure and q0 is vertical effective stress at depth 𝑫𝒇 below the ground
surface.

Calculate the total swell of the foundation due to wetting of expansive clay. (40% marks)

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Part 2 – Mechanical Compaction

(c) By using neat sketches explain the following;

(i) Effect of compactive effort on dry unit weight

(ii) For a given compactive effort, effect of moisture content on shear strength of the soil
(iii) For a given compactive effort, effect of moisture content on permeability of the soil
(15% marks)
(d) Briefly discuss the following three types of rollers used for field compaction by giving
special attention to the coverage, contact pressure, compaction mechanism and applicable
soil types: (i) Smooth wheel roller; (ii) Rubber tired roller and (iii) Sheepsfoot roller.
(15% marks)
(e) A soil in the borrow pit has a water content of 11.7% and the dry density of 16.65 kN/m3. If
2,070 m3 of soil is excavated from it and compacted in an embankment at a porosity of 0.33,
calculate the compacted volume of the embankment (Vcom) that can be constructed out of this
volume of soil. Take specific gravity of the soil as 2.70. You may use the following
equations in the usual notations.
𝑛 𝐺𝑠 𝛾𝑤
𝑒= 𝛾𝑑 = (20% marks)
1−𝑛 1+𝑒

2) A needle punched geotextile filter is to be designed to protect the backfill behind the cantilever
retaining wall shown in Fig.Q2. The wall is 6.0 m in height above the top level of impervious
foundation soil. The wall retains a non-plastic silty sand having properties of
k = 1.5 x 10-4 m/s, d50 =0.15 mm, Cu =5.5 and ID =60%. The candidate geotextile has a
permittivity of 0.02 s-1, and an AOS of 0.30 mm.

Fig.Q2
2
(a) Check the adequacy of the candidate geotextile to prevent soil erosion. (15% marks)
(b) The flow net developed behind the retaining wall is also shown in Fig.Q2. Calculate the
laboratory value of permittivity of the geotextile required to have a factor of safety of 12.
Assume cumulative value of partial factor of safety is 18. (30% marks)
(c) Calculate the laboratory value of transmissivity required for the geotextile to have a factor
of safety of 8 assuming cumulative partial factor of safety of 20. (30% marks)
(d) Briefly explain the laboratory test procedure to determine the permittivity of the candidate
geotextile. If the saturated unit weight of the backfill soil is 18 kN/m 2, what should be the
normal pressure to be applied in this test? (25% marks)

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4
3) (a) Explain the importance of installing vertical drains prior to pre-loading. (10% marks)
(b) What is functionally more efficient with regard to a system of vertical drains; fewer no.
of large-sized vertical drains or larger no. of small-sized vertical drains? Explain why.
(10% marks)
(c) In a highway construction, it was decided to install prefabricated vertical drains
(PVDs) in a 15-km span where a compressible clay layer of 10.8 m thickness needs to
be improved within a 1.2-year timeframe. The contractor decided to use a 4-mm thick
and 100-mm wide rectangular PVD in a square pattern with a spacing of 2.3 m.
Laboratory measurements showed that the coefficients of vertical and horizontal
consolidation of the clay are 2.7m2/yr and 3.1m2/yr, respectively. The boundary below
the clay layer was found to be impervious.
(i) Show that for an installation of square pattern, the effective diameter (De) of
the tributary area is given by
2
De  S where S is the spacing between the PVDs. (10% marks)

(ii) Calculate the equivalent well diameter (Dw) of a drain well. You may use
2( a  b )
Dw  where a, and b are, respectively, the width and the thickness of

a rectangular PVD. (10% marks)
(iii) Calculate the time factor due to horizontal drainage (Th). (10% marks)
(iv) Calculate the degree of consolidation due to radial drainage (Uh).
(10% marks)
(v) Calculate the time factor due to vertical drainage (Tv). (10% marks)
(vi) Calculate the degree of consolidation due to vertical drainage (Uv).
(10% marks)
(vii) Calculate the degree of consolidation due to total drainage (Uvh).
(10% marks)
(viii) If the smear ratio (Ds/Dw; where Ds is the diameter of the smear zone) is 2.5
and the horizontal permeability is reduced by 50% due to the smear effect,
find the degree of consolidation due to total drainage with the smear effect.
(10% marks)
You may assume the following relationships;

cht
Th  2
where ch is the coefficient of horizontal consolidation.
De
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 
   8Th   
U h  1001  exp 

  F (n)  

The function F(n) can be expressed for the following scenarios as
Without smear effect: F (n)  ln(n)  0.75
Ds k h
With smear effect: F (n)  ln(n)  0.75  ln( )(  1)
Dw k s
where De
n
Dw
ks and kh are horizontal permeabilities with and without smear effect, respectively.

 4Tv /  
0.5 
U v  100 0.179 

 1  4Tv /  2.8  

cvt
Tv  2
HD
where HD is the depth of improvement , and cv is the coefficient of vertical consolidation.

U vh  1  (1  U v )(1  U h )