Geotechnical Properties and Applications of Iron Ore Tailings-Amended Lateritic Soil for Road Construction
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17794/rgn.2026.1.12Keywords:
geotechnical, iron ore tailings-amended lateritic soil, subbaseAbstract
The abundance of lateritic soils in Nigeria has made them one of the most used materials for road construction. However, many of these soils exhibit substandard geotechnical properties, necessitating improvements before their deployment in road construction. This study aims to evaluate the geotechnical properties and practical applications of iron ore tailings (IOTs)-amended lateritic soils for road construction. The lateritic soil obtained from a road construction burrow-pit as well as the mixture with IOTs were subjected to mineralogical and geotechnical tests. The lateritic soil contains appreciable amounts of clay (29.1%), fines (52.4%) and sand (46.6%) with a small quantity of gravel (1.0%). Thus, they can be described as clayey sand. In addition, an investigation of its consistency limits indicates that the soil plots above the A-line and classified as highly plastic clay based on their position on the Unified Soil Classification System (USCS) chart. The results of the geotechnical properties indicate a significant improvement in the geotechnical properties of the lateritic soil with the addition of IOT. There was an increase in maximum dry density and California bearing ratio (CBR) with a reduction in the values of liquid limit, plasticity index, linear shrinkage, and unconfined compressive strength. This study demonstrates that the geotechnical properties of the lateritic soil can be modified to fulfil the standard required for utilization as a road subbase and the minimum required can be suitably achieved by mixing about 20% IOTs with lateritic soil.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2025 Sunday Olabisi Daramola, Ayodele Olumuyiwa Owolabi, Olushola Daniel Eniowo, Hendrik Grobler, Moshood Onifade, Manoj Khandelwal
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Creative Commons-BY
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
In agreeing this form, you certify that:
- You read the ethical codex of the RGN zbornik available at journal web.
- You submitted work is your original work, and has not previously been published and does not include any form of plagiarism.
- You own copyright in the submitted work, and are therefore permitted to assign the licence to publish to RGN zbornik.
- Your submitted work contains no violation of any existing copyright or other third party right or any material of an obscene, libellous or otherwise unlawful nature.
- You have obtained permission for and acknowledged the source of any illustrations, diagrams or other material included in the work of which you are not the copyright owner.
- You have taken due care to ensure the accuracy of the work, and that, to the best of your knowledge, there are no false statements made within it.
- All co-authors of this submitted work are aware of, and in agreement with, the terms of this licence and that the submitted manuscript has been approved by these authors.
Publication licence
You retain copyright in your submitted work, according to journal license policy (CC-BY). By signing this form you agree that RGN zbornik may publish it under the publication licence. In summary the licence allows the following:
Anyone is free:
- To copy, distribute, display, and perform the work.
- To make derivative works.
Under the following conditions:
- The original author must always be given credit.
- The work may not be used for commercial purposes.
- If the work is altered, transformed, or built upon, the resulting work may only be distributed under a licence identical to this one.
Exceptions to the licence
In addition to publishing the work printed under the above licence, RGN zbornik will also enable the work to be visible online.
The journal editorial can change the licence rules anytime but it cannot retroactively restrict author(s) rights.
