Experimental Study on Shear Strength of Different Types of Soil

Red clay belongs to region special soil. It has engineering geological properties that are different from general soils. The natural red clay has high ratio void ratio, high moisturecontent, low density and so on. But red clay has non-corresponding high strength, bearing capacity of foundation and low compressibility. With the high speed development of China economy, the main soil named red clay in South is used as bearing stratum of many building foundations. However, when red clay is used as foundation, it is regarded as gerenal clay to consider its bearing capacity of foundation. So this will cause two disadvantages. First, potential is not given full play, resulting in considerable waste. Second, red clay has some special properties, such as high woid ratio, softening in water. These properties will bring hidden troubles, causing some bad accidents. These are caused by lacking of knowledge to engineering properties. Xiamen locates in southeast of China, and red clay is widely distributed. It is formed by accumulation through laterization of granites and basalts. So it is essential to study red clay. In this article, literatures of red clay in Xiamen are collected. Indoor conventional geotechnical tests are done, some engineering property parameters are obtained.