Application Potential of Treated Coir Geotextiles in Unpaved Roads

Abstract

The paper presents the application potential of untreated/treated woven/non-woven coir geotextile in the unpaved roads. The chemical used for the treatment of the coir geotextiles were p-aminophenol, sodium periodate and sodium hydroxide. For this, laboratory monotonic load test was conducted in a test tank for the sand layer overlying clay and the untreated/treated coir geotextiles were placed at the interface under the unsoaked/soaked condition. The results of this study reveal that the models reinforced with untreated/treated woven and non-woven coir geotextiles show the improvement in the bearing capacity beyond a deformation of 9 to 13 mm. Further, models reinforced with untreated/treated woven and non-woven coir geotextiles show better improvement in the bearing capacity in the unsoaked condition in comparison to the soaked condition. Untreated/treated woven/non-woven coir geotextiles when placed at the interface of the sand layer overlying clay can be useful in unpaved roads in improving the bearing capacity especially in those situations where the rut depth is high as the improvement in the bearing capacity was realized up to larger deformation.

Keywords

• woven coir geotextiles
• non-woven coir geotextiles
• chemical treatment
• unpaved road
• soaked
• unsoaked