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Module 39 / Topic 31

GROUND IMPROVEMENT BY VIBRO-COMPACTION - STONE

COLUMNS
The need for ground improvement as a geotechnical activity has become ever
present, since the need always exists to improve poorer soils to adapt them for their
intended uses in geotechnical and foundation engineering. Such a need arises due
to the pressure, rather ‘squeeze’, on land created by the ever increasing tempo of
developmental activities thanks to the escalation in the construction of infrastructural
projects of diverse kinds the world over, especially in developing countries such as
India.

One of the methods of dealing with unfavourable foundation soil, is to try to improve
the soil conditions such that normal foundations can be adapted on them. Methods
aimed at improving soil conditions are collectively called soil/ground improvement
methods. Use of the vibroflotis one such geotechnical method for compacting loose
and highly compressible granular deposits and fills. It is known that imparting vibration
is the most efficient method of compacting loose cohesionless soils and vibroflotation
is a technology developed to achieve the same. This method of compaction is basically
known as vibro-compaction. The technique was originally developed in Germany in
the 1930s.

31.1 Vibroflotation
The vibroflot (see Fig.31.1) consists of a heavy vibratory unit attached to a high
power vibrating machine, which is jetted down into position by opening the bottom jet
(flow upwards). On reaching the desired depth, the vibrating unit is set in motion,
keeping the bottom jet closed and the upper jet open. A cylinder of soil about the
vibroflot will get vibro-compacted in this manner – the size of the cylinder depending
upon the capacity of the vibroflot – with the downward flow of the upper jet assisting
the process. As a result of this compaction, a cone-shaped depression is formed on
the surface which is subsequently filled up with the site soil itself. The unit is withdrawn
upwards in stages, effecting compaction at each stage in the above manner, followed
by filling the depression formed on the surface, till the work is completed and the unit
is finally withdrawn from the ground. The unit is now moved to the adjacent point and
the process repeated till all the points are covered, when one has the entire area made
up of overlapping cylinders of compacted soil (Fig.31.2). If a strip footing foundation
is contemplated, it is obvious that only the foundation line needs be subjected to the
above process of compaction.

31.2 Stone columns

A stone columnrepresents a ground improvement technique of fairly recent origin,
which essentially involves a partial replacement of the soil at site. The purpose is to
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form well compacted columns of clean graded stone, at close spacing at the
foundation site, normally using a vibroflot. The actual behaviour of the stone column
is not quite well established, even though one could visualise them to be acting as
bearing piles, apart from the obvious result of their forming zones or pockets of
granular material having a higher shear strength than the surrounding soil, thus adding
to the soil’s capacity to resist general shear failure, which corresponds to its bearing
capacity (Topic 5). Large quantities of stone are, however, needed to form columns,
and in soft soil they may prove only marginally cheaper than conventional piling,
particularly when considering the higher working load capacity of the latter. Thus,the
essential question appears to be whether to send the stones down as columns, or use
it to make concrete and send the latter down as piles, at the extra cost involved,
considering the greater benefits in performance which may overcome the cost.

The method of making stone columns, as an adjunct of vibroflotation, involves

displacement of the soil and filling the space with stones in the form of columns. (Note
the similarity with ‘displacement pile’ – Sec.11.1.1). Stone columns can also be
formed by the ‘ ‘replacement’ technique (Sec.11.1.1) in which the in-situ soil is
removed and replaced by broken stones, compacted in layers. This type is called
‘rammed stone columns’. The former, which is more common, is also more efficient
on account of the lesser lateral bulging under load, thanks to the higher compaction of
the side soil produced by vibroflotation.

31.3 Ground Improvement by Keller

Keller Grundbau GmbH, of Offenbach, Germany, founded in 1860, is one of the
world’s leading specialist piling and ground improvement contactors. Their major field
of activity is ground improvement in which they are perhaps the most experienced and
comprehensively equipped contractors worldwide. They, like Bauer (Topic.22) have
a manufacturing wing, which supplies equipments for projects involving these
equipments.

In the following an attempt is made to present details of some of the activities of

Keller in the field of vibro-compaction and stone columns, excerpted from their
technical literature.

(It should be clarified at this stage that the author does not hold any brief for either
Bauer or Keller, or any such firm. His intention is merely to present the state of the art
pertaining to these topics as found in the technical literature issued by two leading
German firms who are operating worldwide in their respective fields of expertise.)

31.4 Vibro-compaction
The objective of vibro-compaction is to achieve densification of coarse grained soils
– ranging from fine sand to coarse gravel containing up to 15% silt – to depths
reaching 35 m. The technique was originally introduced by Keller in 1936.
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The effectiveness of the process is based on the fact that vibration allows soil
particles to rearrange themselves into positions giving rise to their optimum density
(Fig.31.3a). This results in settlements of the soil which vary from 5 to 15 % of the
treated depth.Fig.31.3bshows the rotation of the eccentric weight which produces the
vibration.)

Fig.31.4 illustrates the steps involved in the vibro-compaction process.

The technique has been found to increase safe bearing pressures of the soil up to
1 MN/m2 with its potential for economising footing design. The angle of internal friction
(Ø) increases by 5 to 8 degrees, which results in much higher bearing resistance. The
Young’s modulus (E) increases up to 100 MN/m2, leading to considerable reduction in
foundation settlements. The above data depend on the soil, the time spent on the
process and the spacing of the probes, which varies between 1.5 and 4m.

31.5 Vibro-replacement
Keller was the first to develop (1957) vibro-replacement as a method for
constructing stone columns in weak soils and fills made up ofcohesive soils which do
not respond to vibro-compaction.

The steps involved in the creation of the stone columns by vibro-replacement are
illustrated in Fig.31.5.

To produce the necessary keying effect, thereby achieving better interaction

between the stone columns and the surrounding soil, it is necessary that the stone fill
is introduced and compacted in stages by the controlled movement of the vibrator itself
up and down. The ideal is to homogenise the soil-stone composite for the integral
behaviour of the two as a foundation supporting medium having improved bearing
capacity and low compressibility. A great advantage of the presence of the stone
column is that it serves as a radial drainage face(from the soil to the stone column)
and a vertical drainage path as well, contributing to accelerating consolidation of the
cohesive soil resulting in faster settlements. Their general spacings are in the range
of 1.2 to 2.3 m beneath main load bearing foundations, and up to 3 m beneath floor
slabs.

31.5.1 Examples of vibro-replacement

Fig.31.6 shows ground improvement using stone columns for an embankment
carrying twin tracks on the Hamburg-Berlin railway line in Germany executed by Keller.
The ground had layers of organic soil and peat. Measurements revealed that the
anticipated soil deformations caused by track vibration arising from the movement of
the engine and rolling stock have already been completed during the process of
installation of the stone columns themselves.
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Raju et al. (1997) describe the application of stone columns under the Shah Alam
Expressway, near Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in very weak soils such as tin mine tailings
and coastal marine deposits having c values less than 10 kN/m2. The first soil is
predominantly alluvium interspersed with several tin mine tailing deposits. The soils
arising from tin mining activities are predominantly loose sands and slime which is
generally extremely soft clayey silts. On the other hand, the marine soils, close to the
coast, are predominantly quarternary marine and continental deposits of clay and silt,
occasionally mixed with peat. The clays are very soft and normally consolidated. 38%
of the project cost was spent on foundations and ground improvement. It involved in
all 900,000 lin. m. of stone columns.

Fig.31.7 shows a section through marine clay at Shah Alam with the stone columns
joined by a compacted sand blanket at the top. The overall compressibility of the soft
soil has been reduced by improvement factors as high as 5.13.

The soil being extremely low in c values needed testing methods to ascertain its
properties causing the minimum disturbance to the soil. The Dutch electric piezocone
penetrometer test (see Topic.41) was found to be the most suitable. Owing to the
man-made nature of the deposits, the layering and the depth of the soils were found
to be highly variable, requiring a large number of tests. The dynamic cone
penetrometer test (DPT) was found to be a fast and economical method to establish
the stratification of the soil.

The columns with a stiffness of over 100 times that of the soft soil improve the
overall stiffness of the soil, thus vastly reducing settlements. There is a similar overall
improvement in the friction angle (Ø) due to the high values of the same for the
compacted stone columns compared to the very low values of the soft soils, leading
to increased bearing capacity. A significant contribution of the stone columns is that
they act as large vertical drains allowing for the rapid consolidation of the soft soil.
This process is further assisted by the sand blanket laid at the top of the columns (see
Fig.31.7). Settlement monitoring revealed that the settlement rates tended to stabilise
within a period of two months, much ahead of the design assumption.

The conversion of a vast stretch of barren land near Kuala Lumpur, the capital of
Malaysia, for housing all Government Departments and Administrative Units, including
the Prime Minister’s Office – called Putrajaya – in the late 1990s, is a majestic example
of the use of stone columns, installed in their thousands by Keller who have
established a strong presence in Malaysia.

Quality control

At the heart of the installation process is a computerised quality control system

developed by Keller which outputs a complete time history of the entire installation
process. In this manner every stone column in a project is monitored and its quality
assessed and assured before proceeding to the next one.
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The filling of the cone-shaped depression by shovelling in granular material from

the surface, illustrated in Fig.31.5, is called the top fill system. As against this, we
have a bottom feed system in which stone is fed into a skip mounted and moving up
and down on vertical leaders (Fig.31.8). The skip charges the stone into the pipes
attached to the extension tubes and the vibrator. The stone is discharged at the
vibrator nose and is fed continuously to the point of compaction.

The effectiveness of vibro-compaction depends essentially on the grain size

distribution of the soil. Fig.31.9 shows the feasible ranges of grain size for vibro-
compaction andstone columns (vibro-replacement).

31.6 Stone column installation

Stone columns are installed by two techniques, viz., wet and dry.

In the wet technique (see Fig.31.5), the penetration of the vibrator into the ground
is assisted by high velocity water jets issuing at the tip of the vibrator. The action of
the vibrator creates a bore hole, wider than the vibrator, and into the annular space
between the vibrator and the sides of the bore hole are fed broken stones (typically of
size 40-75 mm) from the ground surface. When a charge is fully dropped, the vibrator
is made to move up and down which helps to displace the stones laterally into the
ground, and at the same time, compact the stone column below. Depths up to 30 m
have been reached by this technique.

In the dry method, which is a purely ‘displacement’ process, broken stones (typical
size 15-35 mm) are fed into a skip bucket moving up to the top of the assembly, which
is sent down to the tip of the vibrator using a special tubing (Fig.31.10). Compressed
air is used to assist the entire process.

Reference
Raju, V. R., Alam, M. and Ha, P.(1997), “Vibro-replacement – a technique for
extensive ground improvement works in very soft cohesive soils at the Shah Alam
Expressway,” 4thGeotechnique Colloquim, Darmstadt, Germany,March 1997,
Technical paper 12-65 E, 11 pp.

Video clip

Vid. cl. 31.1 Description: Vibro-replacement, Stone columns, Bored pile/pier, Duration:
2m 30s (Source: KELLER (Germany) - U.K.)