Effect of Aperture Size on the Performance of Bamboo Mat Reinforced Soil Bed

Abstract

Soil reinforcement using natural materials has become popular due to the concern over the environmental issues associated with geosynthetics. Bamboo is one of the fine materials used as soil reinforcement in different forms. This paper investigates the efficacy of bamboo mats with different aperture sizes for soil reinforcement. In India, handwoven mats are utilized from ancient times onwards for various households and other applications. Bamboo mats with rectangular weaving patterns with and without aperture were used for the study. The aperture sizes are expressed in terms of the width of each strip in the bamboo mat (w). The bamboo mat with a square aperture of 0.5 w × 0.5 w, 1 w × 1 w, 2 w × 2 w, 3 w × 3 w and 4 w × 4 w were used for the study. Series of laboratory model tests were performed to assess the performance of bamboo mat reinforced soil bed. The test results show that the inclusion of bamboo mat improves the bearing capacity and reduces footing settlement. The effect of aperture size on the performance of bamboo mat reinforced soil is studied in detail and the results are presented in the paper. The formation of surface heave is considerably reduced and heave reduction factors for different mat types are also reported.

Keywords

• reinforced soil
• bamboo mat
• laboratory model tests
• aperture size
• heave reduction factor