Laboratory Soils Testing

This manual presents recommended testing procedures for making determinations of the soil properties to be used in the design of civil works projects. It is not intended to be a text book on soils testing or to supplant the judgement of design engineers in specifying procedures to satisfy the requirements of a particular project, although it has been used in basic soil mechanics courses. Test procedures included are Water Content, Unit Weights, Void Ratio, Porosity and Degree Of Saturation, Liquid and Plastic Limits, Shrinkage Limit Test, Grain-size Analysis, Compaction Tests, Permeability Tests, Consolidation Test, Swell and Swell Pressure Tests. Drained Direct Shear Test, Triaxial Compression Tests, Determination of Critical Void Ratio, Unconfined Compression Test, Modified Providence Vibrated Density Test, and Pinhole Erosion Test for Identification of Dispersive Clays.