Stabilization of Black Cotton Soil Using Fibers

Abstract

The construction of building and other civil engineering structures on the black cotton soil is highly risky on geotechnical conditions such as settlement of roads and buildings due to low or poor shear strength and high settlement properties of the clayey soil. There is a need for treatment of soil so that the properties used are increased. In general practice, admixtures with fly ash, lime and geo-grids are used frequently to stabilize soils and improve their strength. Fibres are extensively used in civil engineering applications for quite a lot of years. In this study three fibers namely jute, coir, bagasse fibre are used to modify the properties of black cotton soil. With addition of fibers like jute, coir and bagasse, soil properties are seen to change and hence increase drastically. Their low cost, environmental friendly nature, has owed a lot to its engineering properties. Most importantly, the fibers used are waste in nature and also help in cutting up the costs. With varying l/d ratio of different fibres, the soil properties like unconfined compressive strength and California bearing ratio was found to be increased in much higher proportion than normal soil. Keywords - BCS (Black cotton soil ), Jute fibre , Coir fibre , Bagasse fibre , OMC (Optimum Moisture Content) , CBR (California Bearing Ratio) , UCS ( Unconfined Compression Test)