Load Carrying Capacity of Stone Column with and without Horizontal Reinforcing Elements

Ground improvement is commonly adopted in civil engineering practice to bring down the ill effects of poor sub soil conditions on civil engineering structures constructed over them. Compaction, reinforcement by inclusion of stiffer elements into soil, drainage, addition of physical and chemical admixtures, heating and freezing are some of the categories of ground improvement techniques, Stone columns are one of the methods of ground improvement to enhance the engineering behavior of soft clays. Stone columns are vertical column or inclusions of dense compact crushed stone penetrating soft clays. The scope and objective of the present investigation is to study the improvement of performance of stone columns with and without horizontal reinforcing elements made from stone dust in a model testing tank simultaneously the factors of Mean particle size (D50) and Density Index (1D) of stone column material, L/D ratio of stone column and consistency Index (IC) of soil bed are kept constant.