University Of Duhok

Faculty of Engineering
Water resources engineering

Soil Mechanic lab.

Water content

Name : maher hajo alias

Class : A
Test No.:1
Introduction
The water content (w) is also called natural water content or natural moisture
content, is the ratio of the weight of water to the weight of the solids in a given
mass of soil. This ratio is usually expresses ad percentage.

Purpose
This test is used to determine the water content in soil by oven drying method.

Materials:
Soil

Water

Appraturs Required:
 Non-corrodible air-tight container.
 Electric oven, maintain the temperature between 105 to 110 C .
 Desiccators
 Balance of sufficient sensitivity.
Sketches

Procedure

i . Clean the containers with lid dry it and weigh it ( W1 ) . " Make sure you do
this after you have tarred the balance "

ii . Take a specimen of the sample in the container and weigh with lid ( W2 ) .
iii . Keep the container in the oven with lid removed Dry the specimen to
constant weight maintaining the temperature from 105°C to 110 C for a period
varying : with the type of soil but usually 16 to 24 hours .

iv . Record the final constant weight ( W3 ) of the container with dried soil
sample Peat and other Organic soils are to be dried at lower temperature ( say
60° possibly for a longer period

RUNNING THE TEST AND RECORDING THE DATA : i . Weight of can , Wi ( g ) = ii

. Weight of can + wet soil Wz ( g ) = ii . Weight of can + dry soil W3 ( g ) = W ,
W3 100 The Water / Moisture content = W % W ; W The natural moisture
content of the soil sample is
Calculation :
1. Weight of can (W1)
2. Weight of can + wet soil (W2)
3. Weight of can + dry soil (W3)

𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡 = 𝑤 % = (𝑤2 − 𝑤3)/(𝑤3 − 𝑤1) ×100

Type 1 Type 2 Type 3 Type 4 Type 5 Type 6 Type 7

W1 21.63 10.40 13.81 36.88 10.33 12.95 10.26
W2 106.67 58.78 101.18 365.13 111.83 90.7 123.17
W3 87.72 57.23 76.38 258.31 111.44 86.78 91.61
Water 28.6% 3.3% 39.6% 48.2% 0.38% 5.3% 38.8%
content%

Discussion and conclusion

Soil water content is conventionally measured by using oven drying method
that took almost 24 hr. from the experimental works we noted that the
moisture content varies from one location to another. where the location that
is near to a river or that have higher water level results a higher moisture
content in soils .

The moisture content in type1 was (28.6%) and in type2 was (3.3%) this
means that the moisture content changes also from a type of soil to another
type. . Finer(clay and sand) as soils type1 have a higher void ratio than coarse
soils so finer soil holds larger amount of water and those increases the
moisture content of the soil. The reason that the soil in the type2 is more
exposed to the air and sunlight and heat as this soil is more susceptible to
climate factors and this leads to loss of humidity compared to other types. We
have tested 7 different types of soil and this results 7 different water contents
(w%) because of the reasons above and many other reasons….