Abstract:
Characterizing of engineering properties of soil plays a vital role for examining the suitability of the
soils for proposed project wo rk. This paper presents the field and laboratory test results of
subgrade soils that were performed to characterize and mapping of the engineering properties of soils
found in Selamber town.
Characterizing of the engineering behavior of different types of soils is extremely important to civil
engineers because every engineering structure such as a building, a road, a bridge, a monument, etc.
will have to be rested and founded on the ground i.e on some kind of soil deposit that does not get
settled or tilted, damaged due to failure of the foundation soil. Hence, the present research is intended
to characterize index and engineering properties of the soils found in Selamber town.
In order to classify soil, field and laboratory tests were accompanied on selected 8 pits or soil
samples which are taken from the town section randomly. The test results showed that the field dry
density ranges from 1.77g/cc to 1.89g/cc, NMC ranges from 49.68% to 70%, LL ranges from
48.66% to 104.01%, PI ranges from 12.97% to 63.7%, OMC ranges from 21.19 to 35.81%, MDD
ranges from 1.21g/cc to 1.56g/cc, UC ranges from 61.3 to 191.7 Kpa and Cc ranges from 0.0501 to
0.0988.
According to USCS the soil around the study area are grouped under ML, MH and CH soil group or
based on the laboratory test result the study area was characterized as clay soil with soil class of A-7
5 and A-7-6 according to AASHTO soil classification scheme.
The data (field and laboratory test results of the study area) were input into a Geographical
Information System (GIS) frame work to provide interactive maps that show the spatial distribution
of the variables and identify their characteristics. This maps are then used to easily identify the
values of field and laboratory results at various locations of study area.
