Swelling and Consolidation Properties of Clayey Soils Reinforced with Tire-Chips

Excessive production and stockpile of scrap tires cause some environmental and sanitary risks throughout the world. To manage these materials، possible use of soil-tire mixtures has been recently propounded in civil engineering projects. A few studies previously have been conducted to evaluate behavior of clay-tire mixtures، while swelling properties، consolidation and settlement characteristics of this type of mixtures are not known admirably. For this purpose، a number of clay-tire chips mixtures were prepared (by adding 10%، 20%، and 30% tire-chips to the clay)، and compaction and oedometric consolidation tests are carried out on them. The results show that adding tire-chips to the clay، reduces swelling potential of the mixtures، while the free swelling and swelling pressure of specimen consist of 30% tire-chips is negligible. Also، size of the tire-chips may affect the values of free swelling and swelling pressure. In addition، the results of oedometric consolidation tests indicate that when the tire content increases، compression and swelling indices of the specimens decrease and increase، respectively. Moreover، the settlement behavior of the specimens depends on the tire-chips content and size of the chips