The Effect of Water Table Depth on Bearing Capacity of Randomly Distributed Waste Tyre Rubber Fibre Reinforced Clayey Soil

Abstract

The bearing capacity (BC) of footing is considerably governed by soil settlement. In practice, the BC of soil can be improved by reinforcing the soil. The laboratory model tests were performed to investigate the effect of water table depth (WTD) on BC of reinforced soil. Randomly distributed shredded waste tyre rubber fibre (length-19 mm, width-4.5 mm) of 0.75% by dry weight of soil as reinforcement. The circular moulds (height-250 mm, diameter-300 mm) were used to prepare the test samples. A shallow depth, surface loading, smooth base mild steel circular footing (diameter (B)-75 mm, height-60 mm) was used in the study. The WTD maintained at different positions, where the ratio of depth of water table below the base (b) to the base width of the footing (B) is 0, 1, and 2 for both unreinforced and reinforced clayey soil. The samples were kept 96 h for soaking. Tri-axial test loading frame was used to apply compressive load at a strain rate of 1.25 mm/min. The improvements in bearing capacity of reinforced soil over un-reinforced soil are 33% without water table effect and 28%, 23%, 20% with water table effect at b/B ratios are 0, 1, 2, respectively. The WTD greatly decreases the BC. The BC of reinforced soil is greater than that of unreinforced soil for all b/B ratios.