Development of RBI-Overburden–Based Stabilized Material for Unpaved Heavy-Duty Haul Roads

Abstract

In any mining operation, huge quantities of overburden materials such as soil, sandstone and shale are extracted as waste. Generally, waste such as soil and sandstone is used in mines for road construction or haul roads. In many such mines, it is challenging to design haul road pavement to match the dumper capacity. This paper investigates overburden soil to find its utility as a pavement material. It is found that overburden soil is unsuitable pavement material without stabilization; hence, nine composite materials are developed using overburden soil and RBI. Physical, mechanical and microstructural properties of unstabilized and stabilized soil are determined. Statistical analysis is carried out to assess the effect of soil type, RBI and curing period of strength characteristics of unstabilized and stabilized soil. ANOVA tests assess the influence of RBI percentage on soil geotechnical properties, and regression relations are developed. Two-way ANOVA shows the effect of RBI and soil type on soil geotechnical properties, whereas one-way ANOVA shows that the influence of soil type is more than the RBI. The regression relation is developed for CBR, UCS, Poisson’s ratio and modulus of elasticity with a good correlation coefficient. The performance of RBI is more with the finer material and reduces with an increase in the size of soil grains. The performance of the developed composite is better than the earlier developed composite based on overburden with fly ash, lime kiln dust, lime or clinker.