Effect of soaking on the compaction characteristics of al-Najaf sand soil

الملخص EN

The process of salt dissolution is a reason of structure severe deformation by effective settlement.

This paper investigates the effect of soaking process on the soil samples from site near the Faculty of Engineering at University of Kufa.

Four samples (S1, S2, S3 and S4) were taken from different locations near the selected site.

These samples were soaked for two weeks' duration then tested with standard Proctor to estimate the change in the maximum dry density with reference one (natural samples).

All samples experience an increase in the maximum dry density and this increase varies from sample to another (1.02, 18.73, 0.1613 and 5.61%) corresponding to the initial conditions of the samples such as water content (2.78, 8.33, 3.733 and 18.4%).

The soil is expected, according to this increase in density, to experience an additional settlement upon the soaking, and this settlement increases with increasing the duration of soaking process.