Influence of Grain Sizes on Undrained Strength of Sand Mixtures
Bakhtiar Affandy Othman1, Aminaton Marto2, Faizal Pakir3, Amir Zaki Salikin5

1Bakhtiar Affandy Othman, Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
2Aminaton Marto, Malaysia-Japan International Institute of Technology, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
3Faizal Pakir, Faculty of Civil and Enviromental Engineering, Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, Batu Pahat, Johor, Malaysia.
4Amirzaki Salikin, Research Centre of Soft Soil (RECESS), Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia, Batu Pahat, Johor, Malaysia.

Manuscript received on 05 July 2019 | Revised Manuscript received on 09 July 2019 | Manuscript published on 30 July 2019 | PP: 3154-3159 | Volume-8 Issue-9, July 2019 | Retrieval Number: H7457068819/19©BEIESP | DOI: 10.35940/ijitee.H7457.078919

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© The Authors. Blue Eyes Intelligence Engineering and Sciences Publication (BEIESP). This is an open access article under the CC-BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

Abstract: Sand is known as the main material in land reclamation works to develop and widen an area. It is important for the Geotechnical Engineer to ensure the sand used can accommodate the burden imposed from the structures to be built on it. Previous researchers have conducted studies on the strength of sand, whether focusing on the sand itself or with the presence of fines. However, the study of sand grain size effects in sand mixtures in affecting sand behavior is extremely limited. The sizes and angularity of the sand particle are believed to contribute to the behavior of sand mixtures soil. Hence, the study to investigate the effect of sand grain size on sand mixtures in term of undrained strength is being carried out. The sand was sieved to coarse sand, medium sand and fine sand then each size was mixed with kaolin at 0 %, 20 % and 40 %. The undrained strength was obtained from triaxial test on undrained condition. As a result, it is found that the maximum deviator stress, qmax increases with the decrease of fines (kaolin) content. On the other hand, at the same fines content, increased of sand size leads to the increased of qmax, which means the increased of undrained shear strength. In addition, the angular shape of sand particle was thought to contribute to the high value of undrained shear strength for the sand mixtures.
Keywords: Shear Strength, Kaolin, Coarse Sand, Medium Sand, Fine Sand.

Scope of the Article: Geotechnical Engineering