Laboratory and Field Investigation on Variation of Erodibility with Dry Unit Weight of Different Soils

Better understanding the erodibility of a given type of soil can help predict scour at bridge piers more accurately. In the past, researchers have looked into erosion of soils with the ultimate objective of understanding the erodibility with respect to the other geotechnical properties. Most research has shown the difficulties associated with correlating erodibility to any one soil property. The research described in this paper is about an investigation on erodibility and dry unit weight of soil with varying fractions of fines. Soils tested using laboratory Jet Erosion Test (JET) indicated that the logarithm of erodibility makes a linear inverse relationship with the dry unit weight. In situ JETs confirmed the range of erodibilities established by the laboratory JETs. The best correlations between erodibility and dry unit weight appeared within a single category of soil as classified by the Unified Soil Classification System.