SEA-LEVEL RELATED ENGINEERING GEOLOGY AND INTRINSIC COMPRESSION BEHAVIOUR OF BANGKOK CLAYS

Abstract

All the important infrastructures in Bangkok city are founded in soft, stiff to hard clay layers up to 80 m deep. The engineering properties of these clays depend a lot on their microstructure, which in turns is a result of geological conditions governing the deposition and subsequent geological processes of loading, unloading and weathering. Thus, a study of soil microstructure would help understand better the soil engineering properties to be used in geotechnical analyses. In this paper, a detailed review of sea level-related engineering geology of the depositional environment of Bangkok clays was made. Geotechnical boreholes were drilled at six testing sites as part of a groundwater recovery study project, from which samples of Bangkok clays were collected up to 80 m deep and tested. Based on the results of an integrated geological-geotechnical analysis the microstructure of Bangkok clays was indirectly investigated via their intrinsic compression behavior and in-situ state.  It was found that the Soft Bangkok clay at depth 4-11m (SOCL) is a bonding-dominated or cemented clay with a meta-stable structure, whereas stiff clay at depth 12-24m (STCL), the first hard clay at depth 30-50 m (HCL01) and the second hard clay at 50-80 m (HCL02) are fabric dominated with a stable structure. On the plots of void index versus depth the in-situ state the Bangkok soft clay lie in the sedimentation compression range, the stiff clay and the first hard clay lie both in sedimentation compression and overconsolidated clay ranges, while the second deeper hard clay (HCL02) lies only in the overconsolidated clay range.