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LIME
Surface stabilization
The improvement process under the situation when the influence zone is
limited to less than 1m (roads etc.) is called surface stabilization.
In this technique more than two or more soils are blended to improve the
properties of weak soil.
Quite often some additives may also be added for this purpose.
It includes
Cement Stabilization
Lime Stabilization
Bitumen Stabilization
Resin Stabilization
Nanomaterial Stabilization
LIME STABILIZATION
Lime quickly improves the soil condition during construction and can add long term
improvements to key soil properties.
Adding lime can cause three major soil improvements:
Soil Drying Reducing the soil moisture content
Soil Modification Reducing soil plasticity, aiding compaction and increasing early strength
Lime Stabilization Increasing long term strength and reducing swell potential
Lime can be used to stabilize pavement subgrade soil containing clay. Lime stabilization
generates a long term pozzolanic strength-gaining reaction between lime and the silica and
alumina minerals solubilized at high pH from the clay, forming calcium silicates and calcium
aluminates. If the subgrade soil or aggregate base lacks suitable reactive clay, it is advantageous
to add a coal fly ash pozzolanic material along with the lime.
In general, all lime treated fine-grained soils exhibit decreased plasticity, improved workability
and reduced volume change characteristics,
The properties of soil-lime mixtures are dependent on many variables like,
Soil type
lime type
lime percentage, and
curing conditions (time, temperature, moisture)
An unstabilized clay soil has particles that are aligned in a parallel structure
with face-to-face and edge-to-edge interfaces. When the clay particles
begin to move due to lime addition, the alignment is disrupted, and there are
more edge-to-face interfaces resulting in an agglomeration of clay particles
into larger particles
Because of the mineralogy of clay, it reacts with the addition of lime, which
results in both short-term reactions through soil modification and long-term
reactions through soil stabilization.
These clay silicates and clay aluminates bond or gel to the clay particles
together to further strengthen the soil.
TYPES OF LIME
In general, there are primarily three different types of lime that can be added to
soil to achieve stabilization
Hydrated lime, which can also be called slaked lime, is produced by the
exothermic reaction of adding water to quicklime to produce Ca(OH)2
The last type of lime that can be used for lime stabilization is dolomitic lime.
Dolimitic lime is a combination of calcium carbonate (Ca(CO3)) and magnesium
carbonate (Mg(CO3)). It is not particularly reactive and the least commonly used
type for lime stabilization.
The quick lime is more effective than the hydrated lime, but the latter is more
safe and convenient to handle. Generally, hydrated-lime is used. It is also
known as slaked lime.