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An engineering soil at Kermanshah, Zagros Mountains, Iran

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2018

A. D. Burnett ,
P. G. Fookes  and
R. H. S. Robertson
A. D. Burnett
Affiliation:
Engineering Geology Division, Geology Department, Imperial College, London, S. also 3 Hartley Down, Purley, Surrey, CRI 4EE
P. G. Fookes
Affiliation:
Engineering Geology Division, Geology Department, Imperial College, London, S.W.7
R. H. S. Robertson
Affiliation:
Dunmore, Pitlochry, Perthshire
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Abstract

The soils examined are from alluvial sheet deposits in a high valley where they are subjected to alternate wetting and drying, leading to desiccation. They are principally derived from shale and limestone bedrock in the surrounding mountains which are rapidly eroded and transported down valley mainly when the snow melts. The soils have engineering properties of fairly low density, high permeability, high plasticity with the plasticity index above the A line (CH range). These properties are correlated with the size grading and the clay mineralogical composition – about 30% calcite, 45-50 % clay minerals, dominated by Fe3+ and Mg-smectites and fine-grained muscovite. The clay mineralogy is explained in terms of Millot's zone of smectitization affecting biotite from detrital shale fragments, the muscovite remaining substantially unaltered. Calcite solution and redeposition account for the chalky texture and strong bond.

Type
Research Article
Information
Clay Minerals , Volume 9 , Issue 3 , July 1972 , pp. 329 - 343
Copyright
Copyright © The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 1972

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