Experimental Studies on Lateritic Soil Stabilized with Cement, Coir and Aggregate

The characteristics of subgrade soil play a vital role in designing the pavement structure so that the pavement has required support from the bottom layer. During adverse weather conditions and higher traffic loads moving on any pavement, it should be able to withstand the impact and perform well for longer duration. Load is transmitted from pavement to the subgrade layer and distributed evenly through the soil particles. All types of soil are not capable of handling such impacts by their own and needs additional stabilization processes. Several stabilization processes are available in which the best one has to be taken into consideration. Fibers such as coconut coir are important in giving extra stability to the soil particles. Cement is well-known material in construction sector along with aggregates. Lateritic soil is available abundantly in coastal areas of southern parts of India which has porous structure and demands stabilization when the intended purpose is specific and requires higher strength and durability. In this study, coconut coir along with cement and aggregate are taken as stabilization materials to stabilize lateritic soil. Initially, basic properties of soil like plastic limit, liquid limit and plasticity index are determined. Grain size analysis is done and modified Proctor test is conducted to determine the optimum moisture content (OMC) and maximum dry density (MDD) of the soil. Unconfined compression test (UCS), California bearing ratio test (CBR), flexural fatigue analysis, durability properties with respect to wet-dry cycles and freeze–thaw cycles are evaluated for untreated and treated soil specimen. As per UCS values, cement can be taken at an optimum dosage of 6%. The coir fibers from natural husk of coconut and aggregates of 10 mm below size were added to the soil–cement mixes and an optimum dosage of coir and aggregate is determined. The study showed positive results in terms of CBR values of cement-aggregate treated soil.