Recent content by dirtman85

Not without incurring the wrath of HM The Queen. You can purchase them on-line through www.BSIStandards.co.uk

Sodium Hexametaphosphate. For sedimentation tests in UKAS labs in the UK you must use the analr (more expensive) compound.

Controls own WF now so expect they will be pretty similar.

Wykeham Farrance or ELE are the best. Impact is pretty poor imo

That is not BS1377 though and would therefore be classed as a laboratory in-house developed method, which would need to be verified against another recognised standard before being accepted by most customers. In my experience, stick to the 1377 method. LindsayS, I will get back to you regarding...

Correction factors for oversized material are not the best idea Ron, they often entail extrapolation of a curve which is little more than a best guess, correction factors cannot take into account the destructive force on the larger particles as they are totally interdependant, eg; a lump of ash...

What standard are you working from. CBR tests are only suitable for material <20mm. I would suggest a value in excess of 100% would be easily achievable. As for it being unsoaked, there is little point soaking non-cohesive material anyway.

Hi RobPE. I've been a soil technician/supervisor for 15 years in England. BS1377 is the British Standard used by all soil laboratories in the U.K. The cone penetrometer has gradually replaced the Casagrande method in every soil lab I have been to and is now generally accepted to be the...

We have used the cone penetrometer for over 15 years and the method is explained in BS1377:1990 Part 2. The results have proven to be more accurate and it is certainly quicker.

DRC 1, does the hydrometer not measure from coarse sand size down?!

We call it Mechanical analysis or Sedimentation....the really lazy folk just call it pipette!

Sorry fattdad, not my area of expertise i'm afraid. Organic content does affect shrinkabilty of clays though and can have a detrimental effect on particle size analysis in the lab using the pipette method.

We are currently using Potassium Dichromate (inorganic salt) for testing for Organic content in soils as per BS1377:1990. Does anyone know of a safer alternative to this chemical which has/can be successfully proven to have neglible effects on the test results?

BS5930 is the Code of Practice for Site Investigation in Britain and there is a comprehensive section on soil descriptions including how we characterise peat in this country. I understand that all BS manuals are be replaced by Eurocode by 2011.

Typically we apply 8.5kg surcharge on laboratory CBRS and 9.2kg in-situ. We often find engineers are unclear as to their proposed pavement load design and even more unclear what a CBR test is about, they simply want a percentage!! Most in-situ tests are requested on the subgrade which has...