Settlement reduction of peat soil columns improved using MUF-P polymer resin Available to Purchase

Generally, peat is highly compressible medium that is needed to be improved by means of various stabilisation methods including soil columns. Settlement reduction (β) of stabilised soil columns foundation is among other parameters that is commonly can be evaluated by using experimental model in laboratory setup. This parameter also can be studied based upon replacement area ratio (α) and length of stabilised columns. In this study, a scale-down physical model has been developed to simulate deformation of stabilised ground using load bearing test of various soil column models utilising end bearing soil columns foundation concept. The tests were conducted using varying columns arrangements and lengths from 50 mm to 200 mm in rectangular loading chamber with 20 mm fixed columns diameter. Preliminary, precast peat soil columns were treated with powdered melamine urea formaldehyde (MUF-P) polymer resin at designated proportion under wet curing method before installed into peat ground. The result showed that MUF-P resin polymer had significantly improved peat soil ground based on the improvement of settlement reduction with treated precast peat soil columns used in this study only initially cured for 72 hours. The study had shown that reinforcement of peat medium using soil columns method with MUF-P binder had improved the overall performance of settlement reduction ratio along with the increase of replacement area ratio (α) from 14.1% to 23.6%. It is noticeable that improvement of bearing capacity also significant for a longer footing model which was attained at 56 kPa and 68 kPa for α = 9.4% and a=14.1% respectively. Also, it has been found out that the settlement reduction ratios decrease as the column length increases for all depth intervals with respect to length to width ratio (L/B) values.