Page 25 - Handbook GEOTEKNIK_Final_Neat

Empirical Value for Soil Empirical Value for Soil

Cohesive Soil (Clay) Description Very Loose Medium Dense Very

SPT N Undrained Shear Consistency Loose Dense
(Blows/300mm) Strength , C (kPA) SPT (N) ˂ 4 4 - 10 10-30 30-50 >50
u

0-2 10 Very Soft Relative ˂ 0.2 0.2 – 0.4 0.4-0.6 0.6-0.8 >0.8
Density, D
2 – 4 10 – 25 Soft r
Bulk Density 11 – 16 14 – 18 17-20 17-22 20-23
4 – 8 25 – 50 Medium (KN/m )
3
8 – 15 50 – 100 Stiff
15 – 30 100 – 200 Very Stiff After TERZAGHI and DS Cone Re ˂ 20 20 – 40 40-120 120-200 >200
2
> 30 > 200 Hard PECK (1953) (kg/cm )
Meyerhof,  ˂ 30˚ 30˚ - 35˚ 35˚ - 40˚ 40˚ - 45˚ ˃ 45˚

Non Cohesive Soil (Sand)
Peck,  ˂ 29˚ 29˚ - 30˚ 30˚ - 36˚ 36˚ - 41˚ ˃ 41˚
SPT N Internal Friction Angle, Relative Density
(Blows/300 mm) 
Table 2: Empirical Value of , D & Bulk Density of Granular Soil From SPT
r
4 30 Very Loose

4 – 10 30 – 35 Loose Notes:
- Meyerholf,  – lower limit for uniform clean sands and upper limit range for well-
10 – 30 35 – 40 Medium Dense graded sands. For silty sand,  should be reduced by 5˚
- SPT (N’) corrected for depth and for fine saturated sands
30 – 50 40 – 45 Dense - N’ = 15 + ½ (N – 15) if N ˃ 15 and the sand is very fine or silty and saturated.
After KAROL (Terzaghi)
> 50 45 Very Dense (1960) - DS Cone Re = Deep Sounding Cone Resistance Value.

Table 1: Relationship between N-Value with Consistency or Relative Density of the Soils

8 PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT MALAYSIA GEOTECHNICAL ENGINEERING HANDBOOK 9