Davich, Peter

Specification target values for granular materials and fine grained soils are proposed. For granular material, the grading number and field moisture content are used to select the dynamic cone penetrometer (DCP) and light weight deflectometer (LWD) target values. A sieve analysis is used to determine the grading number and an oven dry test to determine the field moisture content. For compacted fine grained soil, the plastic limit and field moisture content are used to determine the target values. The plastic limit is used to classify the soil and to estimate the optimum moisture content for compaction. This report also provides further standardization of the LWD and DCP testing procedures and recommends three seating drops to ensure greater uniformity during testing. The DCP and LWD estimate the strength and modulus of compacted materials. More specifically, they measure the penetration and deflection. When measuring penetration and deflection, the moisture content remains a critical quality control parameter for all compaction operations. Therefore, the moisture content needs to be measured, or estimated confidently, at each location. The LWD and DCP are performance related construction quality assurance tests that are expected to: increase compaction uniformity, lower life cycle pavement costs, increase inspector presence at the construction site, improve documentation, and increase inspector safety and productivity.

Advances in technology have produced a new generation of in situ soil testing devices. Implementation of quality assurance procedures that make use of these devices would improve test precision, increase inspector efficiency and safety, and allow for the direct verification of values used in mechanistic design procedures. During this study, the dynamic cone penetrometer (DCP) and light weight deflectometer (LWD) were used on laboratory prepared specimens. It was found that the Mn/DOT DCP specification accurately assessed compaction quality, although there were some suggestions for improvement. This study reached the following conclusions and recommendations. The DCP penetration should continue until the cone passes through the subbase lift of interest. The DCP seating requirement serves little purpose for a subbase lift that will be covered by subsequent lifts. The acceptable range of moisture contents during DCP testing of granular subbase should be capped at 10%. A sufficient amount of data exists to create an LWD trial specification for granular subbase. A mass of 10 kg, drop height of 50 cm, and plate diameter of 20 cm are recommended. It is also recommended that the LWD specification include three seating drops followed by three data drops at each new height.

Resilient modulus, shear strength, dielectric permittivity, and shear and compressional wave speed values were determined for 36 soil specimens created from the six soil samples. These values show that the soils had larger stiffnesses at low moisture contents. It was also noted during testing that some non-uniformity was present within the axial displacement measurements; larger levels of non-uniformity were associated with low moisture contents, possibly due to more heterogeneous moisture distributions within these specimens. Lastly, the data collected during this study was used to recommend a relationship between granular materials' small strain modulus and their resilient modulus. This relationship was given in the form of a hyperbolic model that accurately represents the strain-dependent modulus reduction of the base and subgrade materials. This model will enable field instruments that test at small strains to estimate the resilient modulus of soil layers placed during construction.