Abstract
This work consisted in determining the geotechnical properties of the soil of the Cubitermes termite mound soil treated with lime for use in road construction in accordance with the relevant standards. The raw soil is composed of 29.45% clay, 45.12% silt and 25.43% sand, and its granulometric curve is above the relevant standard curve. The addition of lime up to 9% decreases the fine fraction content from 75% to 60%, and the maximum dry density from 1.62 t/m3 to 1.36 t/m3. The reduction of the fine fraction should reduce the soil sensitivity to water, and the emission of dust from the road. The compressive strength of the raw soil (3.89 MPa) is higher than that of most cohesive soil, and is probably one the causes of the longevity of the rural road paved with this soil. Treated soil with 6% in lime content has the highest compressive strength (5.95 MPa), and the lowest deformation at failure. Until 28 days, the improvement of the compressive upon the curing time is almost the same for untreated and treated termite mound soils. Thus, this improvement could be mostly attributed to the drying of the samples instead to the pozzolanic reactions. Besides, adding lime also enhances the shear strength of soil. Therefore, adding lime up to 6% in content to the termite mound soil should improve its behavior as surface roads.
Highlights
Earth is the most worldwide used material in construction for thousands of years
The raw soil is composed of 29.45% clay, 45.12% silt and 25.43% sand, and its granulometric curve is above the relevant standard curve
Adding lime up to 6% in content to the termite mound soil should improve its behavior as surface roads
Summary
Earth is the most worldwide used material in construction for thousands of years. In the Republic of Congo, unpaved roads represent 20,123 km, that is 86.61% of the road network (National Development Plan 2018-2022) [1]. In some African areas, the scarcity of suitable conventional road materials had led to the use of unconventional materials such lateritic soils or termite mound soils as roads and landing strip pavements [5] [6] [7] [8]. In 2005, the World Bank has financed the pavement of the road Ngo-Mpouya (65 km) in Republic of Congo with the Cubitermes mound soil This pavement lasted nearly three years instead of one year for the ordinary soils. It would be interesting to know whether the properties of termite mound soils comply with the conventional specifications for these applications
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