Assessment Study of Drying Process Effect on Soil Cracks of Un-Treated and Lime Treated Bobonaro Clay

Abstract

Soil cracks and landslides are indeed major geotechnical challenges in the eastern sector of the Republic of Indonesia–Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste border section. When there is a change in weather from the rainy season to summer, cracks will appear on the Bobonaro clay, besides that there will be changes in the values of the physical and mechanical parameters of Bobonaro clay when exposed to weather. This research focused on crack behavior and analysis of changes in physical and mechanical properties due to the drying process. Laboratory tests will be carried out on 3 samples, namely initial soil conditions, compacted conditions, and soils treated using Ca(OH)2 lime conditions. analysis of crack calculations or Crack Intensity Factor (CIF) values is carried out using matlab 2019a software. The value of the crack intensity factor (CIF) for the initial soil conditions at the end of the drying process was 2.5755% where there were cracks since the beginning of the drying process with crack patterns occurring in almost the entire sample from the edges to the middle of the sample. the value of crack intensity factor (CIF) on compacted soil conditions at the end of the drying process is 1.8787% which is smaller than the initial soil conditions, but the crack pattern is still large and has occurred since the beginning of the drying process. Soil treated with 7% lime had the smallest crack intensity factor (CIF) value at the end of the drying process of 0.5090% and had no crack pattern until the end of the drying process. This indicates that Ca(OH)2 Lime is proven to be effective in reducing cracks for Bobonaro clay.