CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 General

Clay is natural deposit consisting mainly of finest siliceous and aluminous product of

rocks weathering or red residual soil formed by the leaching of silica and enrich with

aluminum and iron oxides, used in the construction of solid building materials called

“Bricks”. This clay bricks are ceramic structural materials that in it’s modern times

are made by processing clay into blocks and sometimes firing them to attain hardness

(Babajide 2011). Clay bricks in their natural form are not fired, but are hardened by

being dried in the sum. This method have been utilized for many centuries and even

today is still in used for regions with hot and proper high climate. There are two

categories of bricks: fired bricks and non-fired bricks, fired bricks are one of the most

strongest and long lasting building materials mostly referred to as artificial stone even

at that, air been dried bricks have a history older than fire bricks: as light weight

bricks are made from expanded clay aggregate. (Umoh, 2015).

The walling materials such as clay bricks has been the subject of investigation for

decades. Partly to serve as an alternative to the conventional sandcrete blocks. Such

effort is especially desirable as it is well known that the production processes of

cement which is the main binder employed in the production of sandcrete blocks is

associated with huge energy consumption and emission of harmful gases such as CO 2.

Therefore, this research is to investigate the engineering properties of clay bricks

using bamboo as fibre and stabilized chemically, which can contribute to reduction in

cost and environmental hazard associated with cement production as well as waste

pollution cause by the littered bamboo. (Ferias, et al, 2012).

In the improvement of ground during the construction of structures, the methods using

plant fibers have been used for a long time. It is known that the stable improvement of

soil material by not only bamboo waste materials but also natural substances has been

done for thousands of years. Hejazi et al. (2012). Various improvements of building

materials using the bamboo have been carried out by efforts to eliminate the bamboo

groves problem and development of construction method considering the environment

in recent years. Several studies showed that the bamboo fiber was the suitable fiber

for mixing with the cement material. As a further improvement, various fibers are

added into lime-soil to enhance the mechanical properties, and to cut down the

vertical and lateral deformation (Kalkan, (2013) and Anggraini, et al., (2015)).

Nishida et al. (2011) carried out an investigateion on the improvement effect due to

the high water absorption by adding the bamboo waste material with the cementitious

solidifying material to the bottom sediment with high water content, they concluded

that, the bottom sediment with high water content can be improved to the

transportable strength by adding the bamboo waste material. It was also revealed that

the improvement effect was larger for the water absorbing material with higher water

absorption ratio. In another research by Yamashita et al. (2013) studied the strength

and cracking characteristics of the building wall mixed with the bamboo as the

reinforcing material. It was discovered that the unconfined compressive strength of

the wall clay mixed with the bamboo was greater than that of the conventional wall

clay mixed with the straw. In addition, it was revealed that the cracked area ratio

decreased by increasing the added amount of the reinforcing material regardless of

that type. In particular, it was reported that the effect of suppressing cracks was

remarkable in the bamboo fiber with long fiber length. Similarly, Sako et al. (2013),

examined the availability of the bamboo chips to prevent the erosion of the
promenade in the historic site. As a result, it was revealed that the specimens mixed

with the bamboo chips had high erosion resistance and increased the unconfined

compression strength. Otsubo et al. (2018) also used the bamboo fiber as the base

material for the sprayer in the greening plant of the slope, and investigated the erosion

preventing the effect of the base material itself. They showed that utilizing the

bamboo fiber resulted in less erosion than the conventional methods. Sato et al.

(2016) investigated the improvement of soft clay by incorporating bamboo chips and

flakes that have high water absorption characteristic of bamboo material.

The demand for sustainable construction materials at low cost is growing as social,

economic and environmental issues evolve in today’s society. As architectural

heritage, earth block masonry attracts the interest of engineers for maintenance and

modern construction since it is a material of high environmental and economical

profile. The utilization of earth in housing construction offers a very high resistance to

fire and provides a comfortably built living environment due to its high thermal and

heat insulation value. It also offers other important factors that attribute to the

achievement of a good house planning/design and construction solution (Obonyo et

al., 2010).

1.2 Statement of the Problem

The earthen houses made from earth bricks are unable to resist high loads due to its

low strength and brittle behavior which causes cracks that appear on the walls and

limits its construction to a single story building. Cracks appear because the soil

particles are not held together with suffificient bonding strength. From Environmental

point of view and economic consideration, this is not a sustainable solution especially

for the poor rural communities of the developing nations like Nigeria. since it has

creates a huge environmental and economic problems, its necessary to find a lasting
solution that can alleviate these problems. Thus, the aim of this research is to

investigate the problems caused by these traditional binders and minimize it by using

environmentally friendly and sustainable alternatives from underutilized wastes (i.e.

bamboo fiber). These kinds of waste should be investigated in order to provide

reliable justification to different applications in building and construction materials.

The main focus in this study is to establish a new possibility of earth brick by adding

natural bamboo fibers with minimum percentage of chemical. Utilization of this waste

product will not only reduce the disaster carbon dioxide problem, but also will be able

to improve the expected to result of its mechanical and physical properties over the

ordinary earth brick.

Agricultural waste products like rice husk, cassava peel, bagasse, bamboo etc are

contributing to disposal problems (Gandhi 2012). So it is very important to investigate

the ways by which it can be used in an effective manner so that it will be useful for

the humans. As the fiber reinforced stabilized earth block usage has advantages.

Focus of the research is utilization of bamboo which is fiber residue, to evaluate the

possibility of its usage in the production of suitable earth brick.

Earth bricks are been in used in construction for many decades, but social acceptance

has been a major problem due to various failure examples. Even though many

governments have promoted the usage of earth bricks, it is regarded as poor building

material. To facilitate acceptance, it is very important to present them with results

which will make them believe that this material is durable which will provide the

comfortable living environment if used in construction.

1.3 Aims and Objective

1.3.1 Aims

The aim of this research is to checally stabilised caly reinforced with bamboo fibre for

interlocking clay bricks.

1.3.2 Objective

The aim of the research will be achieved through the following objectives

To determine the physical properties of the soil (clay)

To investigate the effect of incorporating bamboo fiber on compressive strength of

compressed chemically stabilized clay brick

To study effect of bamboo fiber on water absorption of compressed clay brick

To determine percentage of bamboo fiber that is greatly varies the compressive

strength of compressed chemically stabilized clay brick.

1.4 Justification

Over the years, earthen buildings were the most sustainable and widely used

construction materials in developing countries. The recent interest in using natural

materials is due to the increasing demand for housing as populations increase and to

facilitate reduction of energy consumption in the building industry. Humans have

been building structures using earth far more than 10,000 years. This has been proved

based on the evidence obtained from the building remnants of the Harappa, Mohenjo-

Daro and Jericho (Schroder and Ogletree 2010, Jagadish 2012).

Compaction of a suitable soil-stabilizer mixture can provide a relatively cheap raw

building material. Stabilized pressed soil blocks offer a wide range of advantages in

construction. it maximize the use of local materials with low levels of energy required

for production, simple production and construction methods and good thermal and

acoustic properties. Their application is however, hindered by lack of test procedures

and performance criteria. Some requirements of compressed earth brick like

compressive strength, flexural strength, durability, drying shrinkage, dry density and

water absorption may differ from region to region and should therefore be tested and

documented appropriately.

Natural fibers like bamboo fibers is abundantly found in the developing nations. They

are cheap and could provide not only the required raw material for shelter, but also

some income for the people. No many research has been recorded and documented

the use of bamboo fiber as a reinforcing component for earth bricks, though in the

Southern part of the country are putting it in use. Hence, it an imperative to have a

study carried out which is the goal of this research.

1.5. Scope and Limitations of the Study

This research work dealt with the experimental study on the bamboo fiber reinforced

chemicall stabilized earth blocks. The experimental results were limited to a clay soil

from Bida and its environs and and bamboo fiber was collected from Southern part of

the country. The experimental study on the clay soil will cover the geotechnical

properties of the soil sourced at different location and determination of compressive

strength of the stabilized clay bricks reinforced with bamboo fibre.

1.6 Significance of the Study

This research work focused on the study of the effect of incorporating bamboo fiber

on the compressive strength of chemically stabilized clay bricks to come up with

helpful information which will serve as data base on bamboo fiber incorporated in

earth bricks production. Generally, consultants will benefit from this study as a source

of information about bamboo fiber reinforced earth bricks for interlock projects as

alternative construction materials. The study will provide information that will help

the researchers to come up with appropriate measures to address problems associated

with using chemically stabilized clay brick production regarding its compressive

strength and other researchers will also use the findings as a reference for further

research on compressive strength of stabilized clay brick interlock.