New method of producing artificial tropical residual soils from older British soils

In many cases, the required soil type for research or engineering purposes might not be readily available near the site of the proposed work. Sourcing it from a distant location may involve significant transport costs depending on the quantity required. Therefore, the need to modify locally available materials becomes necessary. Although there are existing methods of soil modification, in this research a new approach has been proposed. The objective is to produce an artificial tropical residual soil (that is not available in the UK), from the available British mudrock material and sand. It involved extensive literature research through which chemical and physical properties of all the soils involved were studied. Laboratory tests to assess the properties of the two British soils involved in this study were also conducted. A mix formula was then designed using a particular method before mixing the two soils in the ratio of 2:3, to obtain the targeted tropical soil. To confirm the product of the experiment tallies with the prediction of analysis and design, the properties of the resulting soil were determined by laboratory testing. The results obtained, were compared with the properties of natural tropical soils and they were found to be very similar.