An Experimental Evaluation of Characteristics of Ball Penetration Test in Soft Clay

This paper briefly presents some characteristics of ball penetration test (BPT) in soft clay. Using experimental data on soft clays from four test sites in Korea and Japan, the effects of penetrometer shapes (i.e., ball vs cone) and of ball size to the penetration resistances are highlighted. In addition, the influence of some soil characteristics to cone and ball strength factors and the effectiveness of BPT in recognizing different sublayers or different depositional units in a soil profile are also discussed.