Effects of pore fluid salinity on the collapsibility of low plasticity clay

¹ Civil Engineering Department, College of Engineering Hashemite University, Zarqa, Jordan P.O. Box 150459, Zarqa 13115, Jordan
² Civil Engineering Department, College of Engineering, Fahad Bin Sultan University, Tabuk, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

^* Corresponding author: hattam@hu.edu.jo

Abstract

This paper presents the results on the influence of pore fluid salinity on the Collapsibility of low plastic clay from Hashemite town, Jordan. Double odometer tests were carried out on natural specimens using pore fluids with different salt concentrations. The results indicate a considerable amount of collapse takes place for the sample with increasing the initial applied pressure on the sample regardless of the initial molding water content. However, the dry side of optimum sample shows larger collapse than that on wet side of optimum sample and vice versa. At low applied initial stresses, the higher the salts percentage in the sample, the larger the collapse occurs. Moreover, the amount of collapse tends to increase with increasing the applied pressure to reach a certain value for a given salts percentage, then the amount of collapse asymptotes to its maximum value or level off with increasing the pressure on the sample.