Soft soil improvement using chemical-rubber chips mixture

Abstract

Soft soils are widely found in many areas around the world as well as in Malaysia. Marine clay is one of the problematic soft soils. The marine clay should be pretreated before the construction to enhance the usability and serviceability of highway constructed on this type of soil. This paper presents the research results on the usability of chemical (SH-85)rubber chips mixtures as the stabilizing agent in improving the characteristics of marine clay from two engineering perspectives; the strength and the compressibility. Three types of laboratory tests were conducted; index soil test, unconfined compression test and oedometer test. The results show that the treated samples had higher unconfined compressive strength compared to untreated sample. The strength of marine clay increased when the amount of the SH-85 increased. The void ratio reduced in value when the chemical-rubber chips mixture was added to the marine clay. It is due to the chemical that acts as a binder that interlocks the rubber chips and the marine clay particles, reducing the compressibility. It has been concluded that the mixture of chemical-rubber chips with 8% SH-85 plus 1% of rubber chips is more effectively improved the characteristics of marine clay.