THE INFLUENCE OF NATURAL OKRA-BANANA GEOTEXTILE ON THE IMPROVEMENT OF ROAD SUBBASE BEARING CAPACITY

Abstract

Low bearing capacity is one of the common problems for soils, especially on-the-road soils in the Philippines. Geotextiles are made to enhance the soil's characteristics. Geosynthetics are geotextiles made of synthetic fibers and are widely available in the market, but because of environmental sustainability issues, natural geotextiles were developed over the years. The study is focused on determining the application of Okra (Abelmoschus esculentus) and Banana (Musa acuminata) natural geotextile in enhancing the California Bearing Ratio (CBR) of subbase soil. The test includes a soil compaction test, a tensile test for the geotextile, and a CBR test for the subbase soil mixed with geotextile. The geotextile was created and cut into strips using the methods of the previous studies. The subbase soil was collected based on the DPWH specifications. The samples tested for CBR include 0%, 1%, 2%, and 3% of geotextile strips mixed with the subbase soil. The result shows that the CBR value increases as the geotextile strip percentage increases. Therefore, the sub-base soil has the best bearing capacity with the 3% Okra-Banana geotextile strips added and has a significant difference compared to the control sample