The unique relationship between swell percent and swell pressure of compacted clays

Expansive soils exhibit high volumetric deformations, posing a serious threat to the stability of structures and foundations. However, measurement of swelling properties is time consuming and requires special and expensive equipment. This study made an attempt to investigate the relationship between these parameters and easily obtained soil properties using various clay mineral mixtures to obtain soils in a wide range of plasticity indices. Free swell percent was correlated to clay percent, water content, dry unit weight, plasticity index, liquidity index and cation exchange capacity using multiple regression analyses. A very high (R = 0.94) fit was also found for a proposed relationship between the percent swell and swell pressure values for samples having a swell pressure ≤300 kPa. It is concluded that the proposed equations offer a rapid and inexpensive substitute for laboratory testing of swell percent/swell pressure in the preliminary stages of site investigations.