Relations between pore-space and hydraulic properties in compacted beds of silty-loam aggregates

Abstract

The aim of this study was to better understand features of the hydrodynamics of aggregated soil from experiments conducted on repacked soil samples. In the laboratory, aggregates 2 to 3 mm in diameter were prepared using a silty-loam material. These aggregates were wet to a water content close to their air-entry point value, and compacted to a predetermined bulk density. Two sets of samples were studied, with mean bulk density ranging between 1.0 and 1.6 Mg·m −3. Aggregates were extracted from samples of a first set, and their bulk density and water retention curve were determined. Water retention curve and unsaturated hydraulic conductivity of samples of a second set were determined using an instantaneous profile method. Experimental results were interpreted with respect to a functional pore-space classification. The water retention properties of the aggregates extracted from the samples were different, although differences in porosity between such aggregates were sometime too small to be measured. This was explained by a narrowing in the constrictions of intra-aggregate pores induced by compaction, even when this compaction was small. Discontinuities in the shape of the hydraulic properties of a loosely-compacted bed of aggregates were found. This was consistent with an independent desaturation of the inter- and intra-aggregate pores. However, unsaturated hydraulic conductivity of the loosely-compacted sample was affected by a small amount of water, which formed menisci between the aggregates close to the air entry point value of the aggregates. Soil hydraulic conductivity increased with the degree of compaction for a range of massbased water contents dryer than the water content at the air-entry point value of the aggregates. The influence of the contact surface between the aggregates on the unsaturated hydraulic conductivity of the samples was quantified, by assuming that water flows only through the aggregates. These experimental results are related to aspects of soil hydrodynamics, which are difficult to study in situ and difficult to predict with the existing models for the soil hydraulic properties.