ABSTRACT
This study presents a new approach for further improving the strength and compressibility characteristic of soils using Type I Portland Cement (PC) and Class F Fly Ash (FA) by processing the individual components of the admixture through ball milling. Unconfined Compression Strength (UCS) and California Bearing Ratio (CBR) Tests were performed on improved soils using 5% PC+5% FA and 10% PC+10% FA. Using 5% PC+5% FA resulted in a 46% and 31% increase in UCS and CBR values, respectively, for improved soils using processed admixtures versus improved soils using unprocessed (commercial) admixtures. Using 10% PC+10% FA resulted in a 55% and 80% increase in UCS and CBR values, respectively, for improved soils using processed admixtures versus improved soils using unprocessed admixtures. The flexible pavement design of a typical 4-lane expressway with 110,000,000 ESALs was used to illustrate the potential cost savings from processing PC and FA components before deep mixing.
