HOW TO DETERMINE WEIGHT VOLUME RELATIONSHIP OF SOIL?

[STEP
BY STEP]
The physical properties of a soil give insight as to the identification of
the soil and the determination of its characteristics and load response.
These properties can be determined by performing a laboratory
analysis on undisturbed soil samples obtained during the test boring
process.
The laboratory analysis should be performed in accordance with the
following ASTM Standard:
D-854: Test Method for Specific Gravity of Soils

It should be noted that laboratory analyses are performed under

controlled conditions with exacting materials and equipment. The
results of such analyses may be considered to be accurate.
A field sample of undisturbed soil will contain three separate and
distinct constituents - solids, water, and air. One of the important
properties that must be determined in the laboratory analysis is that of
the weight-volume relationship of these constituents. The makeup of
this soil sample can be illustrated visually as shown in Fig-1, where V
represents volume, W represents weight, and the subscripts a, w, and s
represent air, water, and solids.
The general procedure by which the weight and volume are determined
is itemized below:
Step 1.
Select the sample to be tested and determine its total volume V. The
units of volume are usually cubic feet.
Step 2.
Weigh the sample to determine its weight W, in pounds. Note that this
weight includes both the weight of the water and the solid
constituents.
Step 3.
The weight of the solid constituents w. must now be determined. The
sample is first oven dried at a constant temperature of 105 to 115
degrees Centigrade. This will drive off all of the free water from the
sample. If there are any clay particles in the sample the drying process
will also remove the absorbed water molecularly bonded to those
particles.
The sample which remains after the drying process consists solely of
solid constituents, whose weight can now be determined.
Step 4.
The weight of water Ww originally contained in the sample can be
determined by subtracting the weight of the solids from the initial
weight of the sample:
Ww = W-Ws
Step 5.
The volume of water Vw, corresponding to the weight of water found in
Step 3, may now be computed. Remember that density is the ratio of
weight to volume, and that the density of water is 62.4 pcf; therefore:
Vw = Ww/62.4
Step 6.
The volume of solids v may be determined by placing the solids from
Step 3 into a container of known volume, and filling the container with
water whose volume is carefully measured. The difference between
these two volumes represents the volume of the solids.
The weights and volumes obtained by these measurements can be used
to determine important physical properties of the in-situ soil from
which the undisturbed sample was obtained.