Haile, Messele (PhD)Markos, Fitsum2018-06-262023-11-112018-06-262023-11-112013-11http://etd.aau.edu.et/handle/12345678/3433Project delays, failures and cost over-run are the results of inadequate and inappropriate soil investigation. Therefore, a thorough and comprehensive geotechnical investigation is an essential requirement to the design and construction of civil engineering projects. This research is intended to investigate some of the engineering properties of Durame soil. To achieve this objective samples from different parts of the city were collected and laboratory tests were done on the collected samples. Identifying the soil characteristic is essential to determine the type of test and test procedure that is applied during sampling, sample preparation and testing. Accordingly, the soil under investigation was identified as Lateritic soil. Moisture content determination using oven temperature of l05°C and Air drying for 15 days were carried out on the soil samples to investigate presence of loosely bound water of hydration. It was found that there is considerable amount of structural water. Atterberg Limits were done for different testing procedures on the soil samples to see effect of test manipulation on concretionary bond. The liquid limit tests were carried out on soil specimens mixed for 5 minutes and 30 minutes durations. It was observed from the test results that the mixing durations has significant effect on the values of liquid limits. Accordingly, the soil samples have been sensitive to test procedures. Analysis of specific gravities of the soils using different pretreatment conditions showed that, increase in drying temperature from an air-dried to 105oC oven drying temperature reduces specific gravity of the soils. Specific Gravity test, Particle Size Distribution, Atterberg Limit tests and Free Swell tests were conducted on air dried and 105oc oven dried pretreatment conditions, and resulted in different values. According to the study for air dried and oven dried temperature of 105oc ; LL ranges between 44 – 79%, PI ranges between 16 – 42%,Clay fraction ranges between 15 – 75%, Free swell ranges between 20-70% and Specific Gravity ranges between 2.52-2.97. ix | P a g e One-dimensional consolidation tests were done and the soils have compression index ranging from 0.219-0.596, recompression index ranging from 0.033-0.097, coefficient of consolidation ranging from 0.012 to 0.351 cm2/sec.enCivil EngineeringThesis