EXPERIMENTAL STUDY OF MOISTURE CONTENT ON STABILITY OF STONE COLUMN

Abstract

Stone column is a ground improvement method for shallow foundation structures and is a popular method now days. Diameter of stone column can vary from 300 mm to 1000 mm and length can be up to 10m. Stone aggregates of particle size 10mm to 70 mm are used for stone column construction. Stability of stone column depends on so many factors such as relative compaction of stone column material, confining pressure offered by surrounding soil, stress concentration ratio, loading condition, stress history of soil, gradation of stone column material, spacing of stone column, dimensions of stone column etc. In this paper, we have discussed the variation in stability of stonemcolumnhwithuthe confiningtpressure of surroundingosoil. By stability, we are actually dealing with the loadjcarryingrcapacityeof stonefcolumn. Confining pressure offered by the surrounding soil depends on thelshearwstrength of theysoil. And shear strength of soil is a function of its moisture content. Here, we have changed the shear strength of soil by changing its moisture content and then computed the loadzcarryingjcapacityfof stonemcolumn experimentally. A graph has also been given which shows the relationship between shear strength of confining soil and loadzcarryingwcapacityvof stonemcolumn.