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    Group 5 Geotechnical Oral Report: Road Geometries

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    Brendon Gova
    The document summarizes the expected site conditions for a proposed road project including bedrock and soil conditions. Bedrock is expected to be quartz sandstone or quartzite based on the local geology of the Malmani subgroup and Pretoria group formations. A mixture of sandy soils and weathered iron-rich clays is anticipated. Additional site investigation is needed to determine the water table, specific rock geometry, and typical soil profile. Atterburg limit testing of soils is recommended to evaluate suitability for use as subgrade. General issues to address include expansive clays and potential landslides in shale bedrock.

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    Group 5 Geotechnical Oral Report: Road Geometries

    Uploaded by

    Brendon Gova
    30 views4 pages
    The document summarizes the expected site conditions for a proposed road project including bedrock and soil conditions. Bedrock is expected to be quartz sandstone or quartzite based on the local geology of the Malmani subgroup and Pretoria group formations. A mixture of sandy soils and weathered iron-rich clays is anticipated. Additional site investigation is needed to determine the water table, specific rock geometry, and typical soil profile. Atterburg limit testing of soils is recommended to evaluate suitability for use as subgrade. General issues to address include expansive clays and potential landslides in shale bedrock.

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    Oral Report

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    The document summarizes the expected site conditions for a proposed road project including bedrock and soil conditions. Bedrock is expected to be quartz sandstone or quartzite based on the local geology of the Malmani subgroup and Pretoria group formations. A mixture of sandy soils and weathered iron-rich clays is anticipated. Additional site investigation is needed to determine the water table, specific rock geometry, and typical soil profile. Atterburg limit testing of soils is recommended to evaluate suitability for use as subgrade. General issues to address include expansive clays and potential landslides in shale bedrock.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    30 views4 pages

    Group 5 Geotechnical Oral Report: Road Geometries

    Uploaded by

    Brendon Gova
    The document summarizes the expected site conditions for a proposed road project including bedrock and soil conditions. Bedrock is expected to be quartz sandstone or quartzite based on the local geology of the Malmani subgroup and Pretoria group formations. A mixture of sandy soils and weathered iron-rich clays is anticipated. Additional site investigation is needed to determine the water table, specific rock geometry, and typical soil profile. Atterburg limit testing of soils is recommended to evaluate suitability for use as subgrade. General issues to address include expansive clays and potential landslides in shale bedrock.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 4

    GROUP 5 GEOTECHNICAL ORAL REPORT

    Road Geometries

    Figure 1 Proposed Road Geometries

    Description of expected site conditions

    Bedrock conditions
    The geology of the area under consideration consists of mostly the Malmani subgroup,
    Pretoria group and other basement rocks.
    Figure 2 Geology if region. The area under consideration lies in the marked boundaries

    The Pretoria Group forms part of the larger Transvaal sequence and consists of over 10
    formations. A significant proportion of rock outcrops and underlying bedrock within the
    region is made up of formation in the Pretoria Group. The formations follow a sheet-like
    geometry. A typical upper section of the Pretoria Group is shown below.

    Figure 3 Typical vertical section across upper formations of Pretoria Group

    The Malmani subgroup also consists of many formations but these are too far
    underground to influence engineering considerations for the conceptual design.
    From this information, it is reasonable to expect a quartz sandstone or quartzite
    bedrock at the site. Some shale and mudrock layers can also be expected between the
    top soil and bedrock.
    Soil Conditions

    Figure 4 South Africa soil map

    A mixture of sand (with a significant amount of quartz) and highly weathered, iron rich
    clays is expected. The clays themselves are expected to be a mixture of high activity
    (smelticic) clays and clays with predominantly kaolinitic clay mineral assemblage.

    Additional information still required


    • Water table height/elevation – important to predict volume changes of clay
    • Specific rock geometry (dip and strike angles) – predicting excavation failure
    • Typical soil profile within area – depth of piers, pressure of in-situ soils on piers

    Tests required
    • Atterburg limit tests – results can be used to evaluate whether the in-situ soil is
    suitable to use as a selected or subgrade layer.

    General problems to be encountered


    • Expansive clays
    • Smoothness of planes in the shales of bedrock – slides into excavations along
    direction of dip

    Way forward
    Information about specific rock geometries and properties of the soil will have to be
    found by looking at previous projects which have been completed in the area. Publicly
    accessible records which documented the construction of the R511 and R512 roads may
    be useful.
    If records of construction prove difficult to find, we will have to consider the worst
    possible site conditions and look at ways to mitigate the effects these conditions have.

    Dealing with expansive clays


    • Low permeability selected fill above the expansive soil
    • Pavement drains in the impermeable subbase
    • Lime stabilization

    Dealing with smoothness of planes in shale


    • The use of a retaining wall may become necessary

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