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Water Contents of A Fine-Grained Soil: Its Shrinkage Limit

The Atterberg limits are critical water contents that describe a soil's consistency: liquid limit is the minimum water for a soil to behave as a liquid; plastic limit is the minimum for the soil to be moldable; shrinkage limit is the maximum water that soil can hold without changing volume. The liquid limit is determined using a Casagrande device by counting blows for a soil groove to close at 10mm, then plotting water content against blows. The plastic limit is found by rolling soil into 3mm threads and recording the water content at which they crumble.

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33 views

Water Contents of A Fine-Grained Soil: Its Shrinkage Limit

The Atterberg limits are critical water contents that describe a soil's consistency: liquid limit is the minimum water for a soil to behave as a liquid; plastic limit is the minimum for the soil to be moldable; shrinkage limit is the maximum water that soil can hold without changing volume. The liquid limit is determined using a Casagrande device by counting blows for a soil groove to close at 10mm, then plotting water content against blows. The plastic limit is found by rolling soil into 3mm threads and recording the water content at which they crumble.

Uploaded by

maaahii
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Introduction:

The Atterberg limits are a basic measure of the critical


Atterberg Limits

water contents of a fine-grained soil: its shrinkage limit,


plastic limit, and liquid limit. The Atterberg limits can
be used to distinguish between silt and clay, and to
distinguish between different types of silts and clays.
The water content at which the soils changes from one
state to the other are known as consistency limits or
Atterberg's limit.
Liquid Limit:
Liquid Limit is defined as the minimum water content at percent
on dry bases at which the soil changes its state from Liquid to
Plastic State.
Atterberg Limits

Plastic Limit:
Plastic Limit is defined as the minimum water content at percent
on dry bases at which a soil enters from Semi-Solid State to
Plastic State.
Shrinkage Limit:
Shrinkage limit is defined as, the maximum water content at which a
reduction in water content will not cause a decrease in the volume of a soil
mass.
It is lowest water content at which soil can still be completely saturated.
Determination of Liquid Limit of Soil:

The liquid limit is determined in the laboratory with the help of the
standard liquid limit apparatus designed by Casagrande.
Atterberg Limits

Apparatus:

1. Casagrande appratus.
2. Sieve No. 40 (ASTM).
3. Spatula.
4. Containers.
5. Tray.
6. Electric Oven.
7. Balance.
Procedure:
1. About 120 g of the specimen passing through 425 micron sieve is mixed
Atterberg Limits

thoroughly with distilled water in the evaporation dish or on a marble plate


to form a uniform paste.
2. A portion of the paste is placed in the cup over the spot where the cup rests
on the base, squeezed down and spread into position and the groove is cut
in the soil pat.
3. The handle is rotated at a rate about 2 revolutions per second, and the
number of blows is counted until the two parts of the soil sample come
into contact at the bottom of the groove along a distance of 10 mm.
Some soils tend to slide on the surface of the cup instead of the flowing. If
this occurs, the result should be discarded, and the test repeated until flowing
does not occur.
Procedure:
4. After recording the number of blows, approximately 10 gram of soil from
Atterberg Limits

near the closed groove is taken for water content determination.

Since it is difficult to adjust the water content precisely equal to the


liquid limit when the groove should close in 25 blows, the liquid limit
is determined by plotting a graph between the number of blows as
abscissa on a logarithmic scale and the corresponding water content
as ordinate.
Procedure:
Atterberg Limits

For plotting the flow curve, at least four to five sets of reading in the range of 10
to 50 blows should be taken.
The water content corresponding to 25 blows is taken as the liquid limit.
Determination of Plastic Limit of Soil.

Apparatus:
Atterberg Limits

1. Glass plat (2 x 2 feet).


2. Spatula.
3. Sieve No. 40 (ASTM).
4. Electric oven.
5. Balance.
Procedure:
1. To determine the plastic limit, the soil specimen, passing
425 micron sieve, is mixed thoroughly with distilled
Atterberg Limits

water until the soil mass becomes plastic enough to be


easily molded with fingers.
2. The plastic soil mass should be left for enough time to
allow water to permeate through the soil mass.
3. A ball is formed with about 8 g of this plastic soil mass
and rolled between the fingers and a glass plate (or
marble plate) with just sufficient pressure to roll the mass
into a thread of uniform diameter throughout its length.
4. When a diameter of 3 mm is reached, the soil is re-
molded again into a ball.
Procedure:
5. This process of rolling and re-molding is repeated until
Atterberg Limits

the thread starts just crumbling at a diameter of 3 mm.


6. The crumbled threads are kept for water content
determination.
7. The test is repeated twice more with fresh samples.
8. The plastic limit (PL) is then taken as the average of
three water contents.

The plasticity index is calculated from the relation: PI = LL – PL.

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