Soil Mechanics
Soil mechanics for civil engineers: soil origins and site investigation with SPT, CPT and field vane tests, phase relationships, grain size and plasticity, USCS and AASHTO classification, compaction and field control, effective stress and capillarity, permeability and seepage with flow nets and numerical solutions, stresses under loaded areas, consolidation settlement and its rate with vertical drains and secondary compression, and shear strength, applied to the glacial lake clays under a municipal operations center on Lake Superior and its soils report.
CIV-340 Year 3 3 credits 12 lessons · 4 h 26 min ▶ Video lessons coming soon
Offered by HSM University · Civil Engineering
This is the American version of this course. See the Canadian version.
What you'll learn
- Explain how glacial and other geological processes form soils, plan a site investigation, and normalize and interpret SPT, CPT and field vane results.
- Use phase relationships to compute water content, void ratio, porosity, saturation, unit weights and relative density, and estimate earthworks quantities.
- Determine grain size distributions, coefficients of uniformity and curvature, Atterberg limits, liquidity index and activity, and judge frost susceptibility.
- Classify soils by the Unified Soil Classification System and the AASHTO system, and describe them for boring logs.
- Interpret standard and modified Proctor tests, write compaction specifications and evaluate field density tests lift by lift.
- Compute total stress, pore pressure and effective stress profiles, including artesian conditions, capillary suction and the effect of dewatering.
- Measure and estimate permeability, compute equivalent permeabilities of layered soils, and check the safety of soils against upward seepage and boiling.
- Solve two-dimensional seepage with flow nets and finite differences to find inflows, pore pressures, exit gradients and the uplift safety of excavation bases.
- Compute vertical stress increases beneath footings and loaded areas with Boussinesq solutions, superposition and the 2:1 method.
- Interpret oedometer tests for the preconsolidation stress and compression indices, and compute consolidation settlement of layered clays under footings and fills.
- Predict the rate of consolidation with Terzaghi's theory and numerical methods, design vertical drains, and estimate secondary compression.
- Determine drained and undrained shear strength from laboratory tests, choose the strength for each design case, and prepare a soils report with recommendations.
Course content
12 lessons · 4 h 26 min total · final exam
- 1 Soil origins and site investigation 24 min · quiz
- 2 Phase relationships 20 min · quiz
- 3 Grain size and plasticity 21 min · quiz
- 4 Soil classification 19 min · quiz
- 5 Compaction 23 min · quiz
- 6 Effective stress and capillarity 22 min · quiz
- 7 Permeability and one-dimensional seepage 24 min · quiz
- 8 Two-dimensional seepage and flow nets 25 min · quiz
- 9 Stresses under loaded areas 20 min · quiz
- 10 Consolidation and settlement 21 min · quiz
- 11 Rate of consolidation and secondary compression 22 min · quiz
- 12 Shear strength and the soils report 24 min · quiz
- E Final exam 20 questions
Requirements
Recommended background. You can start any course at any time.
Description
Soil mechanics for civil engineers: soil origins and site investigation with SPT, CPT and field vane tests, phase relationships, grain size and plasticity, USCS and AASHTO classification, compaction and field control, effective stress and capillarity, permeability and seepage with flow nets and numerical solutions, stresses under loaded areas, consolidation settlement and its rate with vertical drains and secondary compression, and shear strength, applied to the glacial lake clays under a municipal operations center on Lake Superior and its soils report.
Part of the Engineering stream, typically taken in year 3.