International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering

Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 4, Issue 4, April 2014)

Studies On The Strength Of Stabilized Mud Blockmasonry

Using Different Mortar Proportions
Dr. S.Vimala1, Dr. K. Kumarasamy2
1

Professor, civil department,P.S.N.A College of Engineering andTechnology, Kothandaraman Nagar, Dindigul, Tamilnadu,
India
2
Principal, SACS M.A.V.M.M. Engineering College, Madurai, Tamilnadu, India.
Stabilized mud blocks have been used for masonry
construction in Australia, France, India, Columbia, Chile,
Algeria, Brazil, Thailand and many other countries
(Fitzmaurice1 1958, UN2 1964, the Unissae3 1985,
Jagadish4 1988, Houben and guillaud5 1994, Walker6 et.al
2000).
Understanding the strength of stabilized mud block
masonry is essential for a satisfactory use of the new
building material. At present, there is hardly any organized
information on the properties of masonry using stabilized
mud blocks. It is to be noted here that the information
available on the strength of brick masonry may not be
useful for understanding stabilized mud block masonry.
There is hence a clear need for systematic study of various
parameters affecting the strength of stabilized mud block
masonry. CHATRE et al7 have attempted to study the
strength of soil-cement block masonry using square prisms.
REDDY et.al8 has generated some preliminary information
on strength of soil-cement block masonry using stack
bonded prisms. The present investigation attempts to study
the effect of mortar properties on the strength of stabilized
mud block masonry.

Abstract - Stabilized mud blocks (SMBS) are manufactured

by compacting a wetted mixture of soil, sand and stabilizer in
a machine into a high-density block. Such blocks are used for
the construction of load bearing masonry. This paper focuses
on some issues pertaining to strength of stabilized mud block
masonry, both dry and wet, the effect of the strength of five
cement mortar mixes and two soil-cement mortars mixes
using stack-bonded prisms. A systematic experimental
investigation was undertaken to know the parameters
affecting the strength of masonry in cement mortar of
different proportions and soil-cement mortar. Some of the
major findings are: (a) the wet compressive strength of
stabilized mud blocks and masonry prisms are less than the
dry strength ;(b) the wet and dry strengths of these prisms
decreases with decreasing mortar strength.
Keywords-- Compressive Strength, Masonry, Mortars,
Stabilized Mud blocks

I. INTRODUCTION
Mud walls have been used for the buildings since
ancient times. Mud wall buildings can be seen throughout
the world and mud construction techniques are still in
vogue in many parts of the world. Cob wall, adobe,
rammed earth, and wattle and daub are some of the
common techniques of building mud walls. Using mud for
wall construction has distinct advantages. Mud is readily
available locally, low cost, recyclable and environment
friendly and it provides better thermal comfort than other
materials. Major drawbacks of mud walls are larger wall
thickness, loss of strength on saturation and erosion due to
rain impact. These drawbacks can be minimized (or)
eliminated by using soil stabilization techniques. Stabilized
mud blocks are produced via soil stabilization processes.
Stabilized mud blocks can be prepared by compacting a
moist mixture of soil and cement in a machine. It is also
called compressed earth blocks (or) soil-cement blocks
when only cement is used as a binder.

II. MATERIALS AND METHODS

2.1 Stabilized mud Block
Stabilized mud blocks can be prepared by compacting a
moist mixture of soil and cement in a machine. A number
of studies are available on the properties and use of soil
cement blocks for building construction9.A manually
operated machine called AURAM 240 was used to make
blocks for the present study. Locally available soil was
used. The grain size distribution of the soil is shown in fig1. The liquid limit and plastic limit of the soil are 30.6 and
16 respectively.
The block making process consists of mixing the cement
and screened soil (<6mm) by hand and then mixing with
water to get a near optimum moisture content.

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering

Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 4, Issue 4, April 2014)
A cement content of 5% by weight of dry soil was used.
After pressing the blocks were cured for 28 days under wet
burlap. The properties of the blocks are given in table.I as
the means of 5 specimens.

Wet strength was determined after soaking in water for

48 hours. Blocks of 240mmx240mmx90mm were used to
prepare masonry prisms for strength studies.

Percentage finer by weight

100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
0.001

0.01

0.1

10

Particle Diameter in mm
Figure-1 --- Grain Size distribution of the soil
TABLE I
Properties of stabilized mud blocks

Block size
Dry strength N/mm2
Wet strength N/mm2
Water absorption in %

In this investigation five different cement mortar

proportions and soil cement mortar proportions were used
with rather high water cement ratios.
The strength of 50mm cubes tested at different periods is
given in table II. The higher the sand content ratio the
greater was the water requirement. A soil cement mortar
with 5% cement by weightis also attempted. The 50mm
cubes tested for strength were cast using the mortar from
the same mix as used in the masonry prism casting.
It is clear from table II that lean cement mortars with
high water-cement ratios and soil-cement mortar can lead
to low strengths. The increase in mortar strength from 7
days to 28 days varies between 75% to 102% for different
mortar proportions.

240mm x 240mm x 90mm

8.2
3.1
12

2.2 Mortar properties

In general low strength mortars are used for masonry
construction. Cement mortar proportions of 1:6 (cement:
sand) and 1:8 are very common. Masons normally use
rather high water cement ratios for satisfactory
workability, leading to low strengths.

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering

Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 4, Issue 4, April 2014)
TABLE II
Mortar Properties
Compressive
Mortar
2
Proportion Water/Ceme Strength (N/mm )
Cement
: nt Ratio
7 days
28 days
Sand

1:4
1:6
1:8
1 : 10
1 : 12
Soil:
cement

1.0
1.60
2.2
2.8
3.2
-

3.4
1.43
0.92
0.48
0.32
0.49

6.41
2.89
1.61
0.92
0.66
0.70

Table III.
Compressive Strength Of Stabilized Mud Block Masonry Prism:
(Soil+5% Cement Content)
28 days
curing
+ 35 days
drying

Size: 240 mm x 240 mm x510mm Block

Strength:3.1 N/mm2 (Wet) 8.2 N/mm2 (Dry)

9.43
3.63
2.02
1.24
0.60
0.30

DRY

WET

MORTA
R

PROPOR
TION
CEMEN
T: SAND

2.3 Strength of Stabilized Mud Block Masonry

Masonry Specimens
The compressive strength of stabilized mud block
masonry was determined by testing the masonry prisms.
Five block high stack bonded masonry prisms (block size
240mmx240mmx90mm
and
prism
size
240mmx240mmx510mm) were used.
A mortar joint thickness of 10mm was maintained for all
the prisms. The height to thickness ratio of the prism= 2.13.
The prisms were cured for 28 days under wet burlap.
Dry strength was determined after drying in air in sunlight
for 35 days after curing. In case of wet strength, the prisms
were saturated by sprinkling with water before testing. A
minimum of 6 prisms were tested in each case.

MASON
MORTAR
RY
STRENGTH/ PRISM
BLOCK
STREN
STRENGTH
GTH
N/MM2

MASONRY
EFFICIENCY
()

WET
PRISM
STRENG
MORTA
MASON
TH /
R
RY
DRY
STREN
PRISM DRY WET PRISM
GTH/
STREN (D) (W)
STRENG
BLOCK
GTH
TH
STREN
N/MM2
GTH

1:4

1.15

3.2

2.07

1.60 0.39 0.52

0.50

1:6

0.44

3.05

0.93

1.46 0.37 0.47

0.48

1:8

0.25

2.87

0.52

1.30 0.35 0.42

0.45

1 : 10

0.15

2.60

0.30

1.14 0.32 0.38

0.44

1 : 12

0.07

2.12

0.21

0.91 0.26 0.29

0.43

Soil:
cement
(5%)

0.04

1.80

0.23

0.65 0.22 0.21

0.36

- Masonry efficiency= Prism Strength/ Block Strength

III. T EST RESULTS AND D ISCUSSIONS

The prisms are failed by a combination of vertical

splitting of the blocks and crushing of the blocks at the
mortar block interface. In most of the prisms the failure
was initiated by vertical splitting cracks and completed by
crushing of the soil blocks at the mortar block interface.

Details of compressive strength test results of stabilized

mud block prisms are presented in Table III.

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In the case of prisms using lean cement mortar and soilcement mortar the mortar joints were crushed before
vertical splitting started. This clearly shows the influence of
the greater compressibility of the soil-cement mortar. Table
III indicates that in general masonry prism strength
decreases with a decrease in the mortar strength (keeping
the block strength constant) for wet and dry masonry.
It must also be observed that the strength of masonry is
always less than that of block strength. This feature is in
conformity with the results of brick masonry and soilcement block masonry (Hendry11 1966, Venkatarama
Reddy12 1989, Walker14 2004, Venkatarama Reddy and
Ajay Gupta13 2006). Large increases in mortar strength
however do not lead to significant improvement in masonry
strength.
The wet masonry has a strength which is 36 % to 50 %
of the strength of dry masonry. The wet masonry strength is
even less sensitive to mortar strength in comparison with
dry masonry. The use of soil-cement mortar, however leads
to a different behavior and masonry strength drops to 0.65
N/mm2, although the mortar strength is more than that of 1:
12 cement mortar. This is probably due to the greater
compressibility of soil-cement mortar, as well as the lack of
bonding between the block and the mortar.
The behavior of masonry may now be summarized by
introducing a new parameter called as masonry efficiency.
It shall be defined as

When the strengths are being referred to the dry state,

the efficiency shall be designated as d. If the testing is
done under wet condition, the efficiency will be indicated
as w. Table III shows that w is always greater than d.
There is a reassuring state of affairs, since the block
strength is generally rather low when it is immersed in
water. But the wet masonry behaviour is nearly 1 times to
1.34times as efficient as dry masonry. This means that the
strength of wall is not low even if the wet block is
generally weaker than what is normally accepted in
engineering practice. For instance a satisfactory burnt brick
must have strength of 3.5N/ sq.mm according to the
National Building Code of India (1983).However,
Stabilized mud blocks with wet strength of 1.2 to 3.4
N/sq.mm are satisfactory, and since masonry efficiency is
much higher for wet blocks.
A comparison of the stabilized mud block masonry
characteristics and those of brick masonry is presented in
fig-3. It shows a plot of masonry efficiency against the ratio
of mortar strength to block /brick strength. The curves of
earlier workers Murthy and Hendry (1966)11, Venkatarama
Reddy (1989)12, were also generated by them by testing
masonry prisms. The curves show that the behaviour of dry
masonry efficiency (d) for Stabilized mud block masonry
follows the general trend brick masonry. The brick
masonry curves also indicate the trend of increasing
masonry efficiency as the mortar strength increases. In
Stabilized mud block masonry also the same trend of
increasing masonry efficiency as the mortar strength
increases was observed.

Masonry Prism Strength

= Masonry Efficiency =
Block Strength

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Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 4, Issue 4, April 2014)
Dry stabilized Mud block masonry prism
Wet stabilized mud block masonry prism
wet soil-cement block Masonry prism Venkatarama Reddy (1991)
dry soil cement block masonry prism Venkatarama Reddy (1991)
Murthy and Hendry (1966)

Masonry Prism strength/Block strength

0.7

0.6

0.5

0.4

0.3

0.2

0.1

0
0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1.1

1.2

1.3

1.4

1.5

1.6

1.7

1.8

1.9

2.1

Mortar strength/block strength

Fig-3 Influence of Mortar strength on Masonry Efficiency

[6 ] Sumedha Chatre., 1985. Studies on Soil-cement Block Masonry,
Project Report,B.M.S. collge of Engineering ,Bangalore, 19841985.
[7 ] Theunissen,Ph.,1985. Building with earth dimension 3.Bimonthly
review no.4, Information service,Belgain administration for
development cooperation ,Brussels,Belguim,10-12.
[8 ] United Nations (UN), 1964. Soil-cement Its use in building. UN
Dept. of economic and social affairs rep., United Nations, New
York.
[9 ] Venkatrama Reddy B.V., 1983. On the technology of Pressed soil
blocks for Wall construction. M.Sc.(Engg) thesis, department of
civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India.
[10 ] Venkatarama Reddy B.V., 1989. Properties of Soil-cement Block
Masonry, Masonry International ,Vol 3 No 2, 80-84 .
[11 ] Venkatarama Reddy .B.V., and Ajay Gupta ,2006. Strength and
Elastic properties of Stabilized Mud block masonry using cementsoil Mortars. ASCE Journal of materials in civil engineering Vol
18,no3 , 472-476
[12 ] Walker,P.,
VenkataramaReddy,B.V.,
Mesbah,A.,
and
Morel,J.C.,(2000).The case for compressed earth blocks
th
construction.Proc., 6 Int. Seminar on Structural masonary for
developing countries, Bangalore, India,27-35
[13 ] Walker P.J., 2004. Strength and Erosion characteristics of earth
blocks and earth block masonry. Journal of materials in civil
engineering vol.16 (5), 497-506.

IV. CONCLUSION
The wet compressive strength of stabilized mud block
and masonry prisms is less than the dry strength.
The wet and dry strengths of these masonry prisms
decrease with decreasing mortar strength.
The masonry efficiency of stabilized mud block work in
wet state is 0.52 to 0.21 and the Value in dry state is 0.39
to 0.22.
The ratio of Wet Prism Strength to Dry prism Strength
varies from 0.50 to 0.36
REFERENCES
[1 ] Fitzmaurice Robert, 1958.Manual on Stabilized Soil Construction
for Housing. U.N Technical Assistance Programme, New York.
[2 ] Houben,H., and Guillaud ,H.,1994. Earth constructionA
comprehensive guide, Intermediate technology development group,
London.
[3 ] Jagadish, K.S., 1998. The progress of stabilized soil construction in
India.,Proc., National seminar on stabilized mud blocks for housing
and building , Bangalore, India Vol.1, ,17-43
[4 ] Lunt ,M.G., 1980. Stabilized soil Blocks for Building. Overseas
Building Notes, February No.184.
[5 ] Murthy, C.K. and Hendry, 1966. Model experiments in load bearing
Brickwork, Build.Sci. Vol 1, 289-298,

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