ETDCM8- 8th Seminar on Experimental Techniques and Design in Composite Materials

3-6 October 2007 – Sant’Elmo Beach Hotel – Castiadas – Costa Rei – Sardinia (Italy)

MECHANICAL BEHAVIOUR OF SOIL STABILIZED

WITH DIFFERENT FIBRES FOR EARTHEN CONSTRUCTION

F. Aymericha, L. Fenub, P. Melonic

a
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Meccanica –Università di Cagliari
b
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Strutturale –Università di Cagliari
c
Dipartimento di Ingegneria Chimica e Materiali –Università di Cagliari

In the tradition of earthen buildings, soil is stabilized in different ways in order to improve its
performance. Different stabilizers have been used, such as dung, urine, lime, bitumen, cement, oils,
vegetal additives and fibres, blood of animals, casein and other animal proteins. All these additives
have a proper role in soil stabilization and a number of them are for instance used to make the soil
less permeable and erodable.
In this paper soil stabilization with different fibres, with a particular attention to the influence of the
reinforcement on the final ductility and toughness of the material, is investigated. The addition of
fibres greatly reduces cracking, makes the soil less brittle and allows to control soil shrinkage. The
use of fibres is particularly favourable not only for the limitation of initial cracks due to shrinkage,
but also for avoiding fracture propagation, as fibres are practically the only resource of soil to
control crack propagation.
The soil investigated in this study is traditionally used for earthen constructions in the villages near
Oristano, in Sardinia. Its characteristics are summarized in table 1 and fig. 1.
The soil was mixed with about 20% of water and added with fibres, except in one case, where the
sample was made without fibres in order to compare the results. Natural and artificial fibres were
used, the former obtained from posidonia (fibre length 10 mm) and from hemp (length 35 mm), the
latter made of polypropylene (length 19 mm).
Since ductility and toughness are investigated, notched samples were manufactured, with cross
section 75mm X 75mm, length 360mm and central notch depth 25 mm.
Four types of reinforced samples were made: FC with 5% of posidonia fibres, FL with 3% of hemp
fibres, FP with 2% of polypropylene fibres, and MIX with 2.5% of posidonia and 1.5% of hemp
fibres.
After curing, three points tests were performed on a servoelectric tension/compression machine.
The support distance was 310 mm and both the load and the mid-span displacement were acquired
during the test by the load cell of the testing machine and an LVDT transducer, respectively.

Table 1 : Earth properties

LIQUID LIMIT PLASTIC LIMIT PLASTIC INDEX PASSING SIEVE 0.075 mm
(%) (%) (%)
28 17 11 78
U.S.C.S. CLASSIFICATION: CL
MINERALOGICAL COMPOSITION: QUARTZ, PLAGIOCLASE, ILLITE
 Fig. 1: Granulometric curve of earth

The experimental results, summarized in fig. 2, indicate that, as expected, fibres make the soil less
brittle and that the work of fracture is highly affected by the fibre type.
FL samples with long hemp fibres show a much higher work of fracture compared to the other
samples. Their ductility is also surprising, as large deformations are achieved and the load, after its
peak, decreases very slowly.
FC samples exhibit a load-displacement curve typical of cohesive fracture and show that posidonia
fibres, even though rather short, are able to avoid the brittle failure typical of plain soil samples. On
the other hand, fibre length appears to be too small to greatly increase the fracture toughness of the
material.
MIX samples have, as expected, an intermediate behaviour. Their work of fracture could be
possibly improved by increasing the percentage of long hemp fibres with respect to that of
posidonia.
Finally, FP samples with polypropylene fibres exhibit a rather high work of fracture, thus
suggesting that a fibre length of about 20 mm is sufficient to significantly modify the fracture
behaviour of soil.
The experimental findings just summarized show that a proper use of fibre reinforcement can
significantly improve the structural behaviour of earth masonry constructions by giving the earthen
material both a higher ductility and a larger fracture toughness.

800

FL

600
Load (N)

400 FP

MIX

200 NF
FC

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14
Displacement (mm)
Fig. 2 : Typical force-displacement curves of notched samples