LIQUID LIMIT TEST

Purpose
It is made for the purpose of determining the liquid limit (wL) of soil samples. Liquid limit is
the water content of the floor measured by the liquid limit experiment at the moment when it
passes from a plastic state to a flowing state.

The Standard Used Is

TS 1900-1: Floor Laboratory Experiments in Civil Engineering - Part 1:
Determination of Physical Properties

Equipment Used
 * Standard liquid limit test instrument with hard plastic base (Figure 1)
 * Standard gouging knife
 * Semi-logarithmic graph paper
 * Spatula
 * Plastic bottle full of distilled water
 • Small metal or glass containers with numbered on them
 • A study at a temperature of 110(±5) °C
 * sieve and pan of 425 µm (number 40)
 • A metal or plastic ruler
 * Libra
 Resim 1.(Casagrande experimental equipment)
Construction of
the Experiment

 The liquid limit is dried in the study by taking an amount that can represent this mass
from the ground mass that wants to be learned and. The dried ground is sifted through
a 425 µm sieve (numbered 40) and about 200 g of sample is taken from it. The sample
is placed in a container and very small amounts of distilled water are gradually added
to the sample and thoroughly mixed each time. This mixture is kept in an airtight
container in a desiccator at room temperature for 24 hours in order to ensure that water
spreads throughout the sample. The initial water content should be lower than the
liquiq limit.
 During the experiment, the height at which the liquid limit device container will be
lifted should be adjusted so that the gauge scale with a thickness of 1 cm can pass
from the container to the Decal between the container and the base when the container
is brought to its highest state. It is necessary to thoroughly clean the instrument before
the experiment.
 The sample is removed from the container and re-mixed for at least 10 minutes. In
order to obtain reliable results on some soils, before starting the experiment, the
sample should be it may need to be stirred continuously for a period of time that can
extend up to 40 minutes.
 The bowl of the Casagrande instrument is placed on a hard plastic, a portion of the
sample is taken from the ready-made sample with a spatula and placed inside the
bowl. Care is taken not to leave air bubbles inside the sample during placement. The
surface of the sample placed in the bowl is corrected so that it is horizontal. The
thickest part of the sample placed in the bowl should be approximately 1 cm.
 A slit is opened from the middle of the sample placed in the bowl with a standard
gouging knife. Care should be taken when opening the slit in the sample cake and it
should be ensured that the slit is perfectly smooth. This should be done very quickly
and the sample cake should not be allowed to dry out.
 In some floors, the groove tends to close through the sliding of the floor along the
surface of the container, instead of closing through the flow on the floor. In such cases,
the result obtained should not be trusted and the experiment should be repeated until
the flow is observed on the ground. If water is added several times, but there is still a
shift, it is concluded that the experiment cannot be applied on this ground, and the
experiment report indicates that the liquid limit cannot be measured.
 In an experiment conducted using a power tool, the time period and the number of falls
in the falls (N) since it will be performed automatically by the tool, only the closure at
the base of the slit should be monitored and the tool should be stopped if the closure is 1
cm.
 After the tool is stopped, a 30 g sample is taken from the area where there is a 1 cm
closure (it should not be less than 10 g) using a dry and clean spatula and placed in a
small metal container. It is weighed on a scale with an accuracy of 0.01 gr, its mass is
recorded and it is placed in the study to determine the water content.
 The sample remaining on the alert plate is completely collected and placed back into
its previous container. The plate is thoroughly cleaned, dried, and prepared for the next
experiment. This process is repeated at least five times. The initial selection of water
and the amounts of water added during the experiment should be adjusted to ensure
 that the drop numbers obtained are distributed evenly between 10 and 50. The
experiment should be conducted by increasing the water content of the sample. Each
time the sample is removed from the liquid limit dish to add water, the dish and
groove-opening knife must be washed and dried.

Calculations and Presentation of Results

 the water content (w) for each sample is calculated using the
formula
where :

 M1 is the mass of the container (g),

 M2 is the mass of the container plus the wet sample (g),
 M3 is the mass of the container plus the dry sample (g).
This formula expresses the water content as a percentage.

Determining the water contents of the samples:

 Number of Container 110 314 315
56.05 45.01 53.67
Mass of the container
+ the wet sample
(M2), g
Mass of the container 51.34 41.26 48.58
+ the dry sample
(M3), g
Mass of the container 35.04 29.10 33.20
(M1), g
MK: Dry sample 16.30 12.16 15.38
mass (MK = M3 -
M1) (g)

4.71 3.75 5.09

MW: Water mass
(MW = M2 - M3) (g)
WATER 28.89 30.83 33.09
CONTENT
(w=100Mw/MK),
%

Displaying the number of strokes and water contents;

Number of Water content Number of

Container (w) strokes (N)
110 28.89 26
314 30.83 19
315 33.09 16

33
33.09
32,5
Water Content (w, %)

32
31,5
31 30.83
30,5
30
29,5
29 28.89
28,5
26
Number of strokes log(N)
Figure 2. Finding the optimum water content with the relationship between water content and
drop count.

On the logarithmic axis, the water content corresponds to the LL value for 25 blows. In this
graph, the water content value corresponding to 25 blows is 29.1%.