Water uptake by aggregates

Abstract

SummaryThe Green & Ampt infiltration analysis is applied to the problem of the water uptake by aggregates when they are surrounded by water. Two situations are analysed, namely, when there is free escape of the displaced air and when there is no escape of the air. These extreme situations provide bounds for estimating the water uptake for the practical case when some air escapes through the aggregate's surface in the form of bubbles as the aggregate wets up. It is shown that the rate of water uptake is directly proportional to the square of the sorptivity of the aggregate material and inversely proportional to the square of the final water uptake. Experiments on spherical stabilized clay aggregates of different radii were in agreement with the theoretical analysis that predicted the observed very rapid wetting up. The analysis also showed that when there was free escape of air, the rate of advance of the wetting front into cylindrical and spherical aggregates decreased from an initially infinite value to a minimum value and then increased to an infinitely large value when the front reached the centre of the aggregate, in contrast to the continually decreasing rate into plate‐like aggregates. This was demonstrated in experiments on the radial water movement into a fine sand contained in a cone.The analysis and experimental results indicate that preferential macropore flow in aggregated soils can be initiated very rapidly when air entrapment occurs within the aggregates.