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Frequently Asked Question
There are many questions that arise when using
or learning about any technology, I will attempt to answer the most
frequently asked in no particular order.
- Q:
What can be expected of Endurazyme.
- A:
Endurazyme was formulated to increase the overall strength of poor
quality clay based soils in the subgrade of pavements. It then
requires less good quality gravels owing to the increase in CBR's
of the subgrade and depending on the engineers design, possibly a
thinner wear coat.
- Q:
What is the setting or curing time for
Endurazyme.
- A:
Curing time is 7 days but cure continues for 28 days.
- Q
: How soon can traffic be run on the
road.
- A:
All during the construction and immediately after.
- Q : Cracking and or
crazing has occurred on the surface, Why.
- A
: Over optimum moisture content during construction or heavy rain
during or after construction. read our our manual
- Q
: What can be done to correct this and what
will be the effect.
- A
: Two things can be done, on heavy traffic roads it
will correct it's self with no problems or the surface 20mm can be
re-worked as you have 7 days curing.
- Q
: How much gain in CBR can be
expected.
- A
: This will depend on the soil and gravel being
treated, but anywhere from 100% to 1200%. Independent
empirical evidence is available. See our online
manual
- Q
: Can the surface be maintained should it be
damaged or worn.
- A
: Yes! But Endurazyme must be used to patch or resurface the
treated road. Please ask for a Maintenance Guide.
- Q
: If for some reason a customer does NOT
profile the gravel road with a 5-6 % gradient to each side, but
"accidentally" keeps it 100 % horizontal, then what
?
- A
: Good work practices are essential to good road construction and
should only be carried out by professionals. Drainage and profile
errors are nothing to do with the efficacy of the product and
puddling will occur which will undermine the road.
- Q
:Does water quality effect the
result ?
- A :
Generally no! Brackish water and sea water have been used
successfully but the better the water supply the less problems
will occur.
- Q
: Can Endurazyme be used with Lime or
Cement.
- A
: Endurazyme will allow the use of both to be cut by
half and a massive increase in CBR's cab be gained along with huge
savings in material costs. More information available on
request. more on Cement and Lime
- Q
: What is the largest benefit to using
Endurazyme.
- A
: Using low quality insitu soils and gravel's to construct
low cost low maintenance roads. Saving valuable resources in the
construction of highways.
- Q
: What are the main elements of
Endurazyme.
- A
: There are three main elements
1] sophisticated surfactants that allow the other two
elements to penetrate the clay based soils and make it workable.
2] electrolytes that change the cation exchange of the clay
platelets and 3] enzymes that cement together the
clay platelets within the sands, silts and gravel's. More information
- Q
:If we
double the application rate will we get twice the strength
?.
- A : No! You lose the
benefit of the cation exchange as it will be reversed and you will
end up with a lower strength.
- Q : Freeze / Thaw.. Is Endurazyme effected by
freeze/thaw.
- A
: No! Endurazyme is not effected by
freeze thaw, this is documented over many years but Endurazyme
should not be applied in freeze conditions.
- Q: We are still getting dust from the road after 3
weeks, why?
- A:
The soil used is low in clay
content and high in silt fines, a proportional mix design should
have been used. Remember clay is the binder and that Endurazyme
only works on the clay particles within a soil / gravel
mix.
- Q: It rained within seven days of construction and the
road got very slippery and wheel tracks could be
seen.
- A: This has do with good
work practices during construction which include, rain during construction,
correct drainage and profile
( see notes below ).
- Q: If 82% of the enzymes are gone within 48 hours, how
is it possible that only water will activate the enzymes up to 7
days, enough that a thin layer of gravel can then be rolled into
the surface? We tried after three days and the surface was so hard
that it would not penetrate the surface?
- A: The fact is that
Endurazyme is 82% biodegraded in 14 days and you have 7 days that
you can store the treated soil prior to compaction. After
full compaction the surface will be tight and will require
re-application of Endurazyme at 1000 to 1 to soften the
surface.
- Q: Which roller is best, can you clear this question
up?
- A: All rollers have there
place in the construction process and they all be used were
possible in there role. (Please see notes below on
compaction). Or go to
PLANT AND MACHINERY.
- Q: It has been said by Brian that they only roll in a
thin layer of gravel if the road is on a hill and that is it
not necessary on a flat road. Yet, we are now recommending that it
be done on all projects. Why?
- A:
This action is employed were the
soils are mainly fines and the soil lacks gravel and grading, on
hills as a precaution, should it rain within seven days of
construction. If the grading of the soil is ideal this is
just another added cost to low cost roads.
- Q: There is a lot of sediment in the bottom of the
drum, why?
- A:
Endurazyme is shipped abroad in a
highly concentrated form and is fresh from the factory, it should
be shaken a little prior to use. There is nothing wrong with the
product and even if not shaken it is full strength, the sediment
is a result of the culture and fermentation
- Q:
We are still getting dust from the
road after 3 weeks, why?
- A: The soil used is low in
clay content and high in silt fines, a proportional mix design
should have been used. Remember clay is the binder and that
Endurazyme only works on the clay particles within a soil / gravel
mix.
- Q: It rained within seven days of construction and the
road got very Slippery and wheel tracks could be
seen?
- A: This has do
with good work practices during construction which include,
rain during construction, correct drainage and profile ( see
notes below ).
- Q:
It has been said by Brian that they
only roll in a thin layer of gravel if the road is on
a hill and that is it not necessary on a flat road. Yet, we are
now recommending that it be done on all projects.
Why?
- A: This action is employed
were the soils are mainly fines and the soil lacks gravel and
grading, on hills as a precaution, should it rain within seven
days of construction. If the grading of the soil is ideal
this is just another added cost to low cost roads.
- Q: In your E-book, there is a table showing that 40 %
clay gives about 17 plasticity index. Wouldn't 40 % normally give a far
too slippery and "crocodile-cracking"
surface ?
- A: One must remember that
testing is only carried out on the soils passing the 425um sieve,
the total equation and therefore the overall percentage would be
less, "crocodile-cracking" surface is caused only through high
moisture content at compaction.
- Q:
Would you say that an increase of
the Plastic Index from say 8 to say 15, has any specific
advantages towards the end-result ?
- A: Yes! if you look at our
grading chart the ideal is a plastic index of 17% backed up by a
good grading of silts ,sands and gravel to add to the overall
strength. The clay content plus Endurazyme are the cement that
binds the mass together. Click
for Grading
chart
- Q:
When you are making your own
calculations on clay-addition on a job, do you normally work on the
basis weight/weight and thus use different bulk densities on
clay and rest respectively to come up with the % clay necessary?
- A: No we use a proportional
mix design that we have put together over the years and update
from time to time.
( this spread sheet is available on
request)
- Q:
I checked grain size distributions
of aggregates we have now. Maximum grain sizes are 20-32 mm. One
aggregate has about 7-8 % fines (<0.063 mm) we use the 0.075mm
sieve] and two others aggregates have about 15-17 %
fines.
- A:
All three soils are below the
required guide lines of a minimum of 20% passing the 0.075 sieve
but the PI could put them within possibility of improvement in
CBR. The increase in CBR will not be as great but could make
an otherwise useless resource into a better road. I suggest
we try to view the Atterberg Limits when they are available.
Most soils will have some silt content unless the are straight
sandy gravels. Click to see:
See the
manual on line
- Q:
So it seems according to your
recommendations that using Endurazyme is not suitably for those
aggregates (on your web page lower limit was 20 % of fines (<
0,075 mm). We are now checking PI and doing also hydrometer
tests.
- A:
As above this may change when we
see the PI and especially the Hydrometer tests.
- Q:
Later we will have till, that
probably fit to the working area of Endurazyme and that we will
know in 2-3 months. If the till is suitable could you in that case
sent us Endurazyme
- A:
The word TILL is an agricultural
word and represents tilled soil [ loose soil ready for planting ]
and can be made up of all sorts of different mixes for different
crops, most crop soils require a certain amount of clay/silt/sand
mix in various percentages so a soil analysis will be the only way
to tell its suitability.
- Q:
That's why I would like to know how
much clay particles there should be (for us clay particle
<0,002 mm) or is Endurazyme suitably for till that has fines
20--40% and PI = 8-12.
- A:
Clay particle size is correct at
0.002mm or 2 micron. The confusion here is that the
soils passing the 75 micron sieve can be at lower than 20%
if the clay content and PI of that soil is high enough to
compensate. Basically only silts and clays pass the 75
micron sieve, so this is the reason it is used as a rule of thumb
in the field. Hydrometer tests confirm and verify the
percentage of silt and clay fractions.
Profile: The road profile is very important in
the construction of a dirt road and should be between 5 and 6 % to a
central crown, compaction from the centre out on both sides so that
the integrity of the crown is not changed.
Drainage:
Table drains and culvert design are in the hands of the
design engineer and any fault in this area is not the fault of the
product or the workers on the day.
Delamination: Is caused by layers of soil being
compacted at different moisture contents and the use of heavy steel
drum rollers usually on vibration mode. This will happen no
matter what is used from plain water to stabilisation product
including lime and cement. Moisture content must be controlled at
all times from wetting out the base to layers and final trim. Good
work practices. See also (Click
here )to see more
Compaction: This is a large subject
and has many different viewpoints held by academics and engineers
worldwide. Almost all of these views are held and vented on
non plastic soils and the teaching in general is to exclude clay
from any construction were possible. For clay areas were highway
construction is in progress all forms of compaction will be used and
mostly in this order:
Sheepsfoot, steel drum and rubber
tyre.
For more information I suggest the
links below, on Google.com there are 76,000
pages.
Compaction1
Compaction2
Compaction3
You must be online to activate the above links.
Compaction: Endurazyme
and dirt road construction:
Dirt
road construction is low cost construction and is the finished
product, it does not usually come under the same strict design
control as highways. Good work practices must still be adhered to at
all times.
Ideally all
three
roller types should be used during construction but excellent roads
have been constructed using nothing but the steel drum roller and
the water cart used as the rubber tyre roller. The point here
is that a steel drum roller will bridge soft spots but the wobbly
tyre roller will not, potholes can be the result of poor compaction,
rubber tyre rollers give a better finish to fine soils and dehydrate
the moisture far more rapidly.
( Heavy traffic will accelerate the cure and
seal the surface)
Rain:
If rain is expected on the day of construction use the local
knowledge available to gauge the extent of rain that is normal and
use as little water as possible to apply Endurazyme to the soil. Use
the rain instead of the water truck and continue to work the soil
ready for compaction, it is most important that the road is fully
compacted prior to leaving the site. If heavy rain suddenly
appears from nowhere and you are in the middle of construction,
simply grade all treated soil into one windrow and lay out later or
when the rain stops, up to seven days after application of
Endurazyme. On returning make sure the base has a moisture content
equal to the treated soil to be laid so that delamination does not
occur, Endurazyme at 1000 to 1 in the water truck during this
procedure will help ensure sufficient bonding. Nobody can
change the weather but good work practices and knowledge of how
Endurazyme works will always get a great result. Endurazyme has
three main elements, the one of concern were moisture is in
abundance (rain) is the very sophisticated surfactants in the
formulation. These surfactants are used to get into the clay
based soils and take with it the other two very important elements,
they also render the water ten times wetter than water alone and
increase the drying time to allow for a slow cure to eliminate
cracking and shrinking. So you can see that if you then add more
moisture you are headed for major problems. Conclusion: good
profile, compaction and finish are paramount and then all rain will
end up in the table drains were it should be.
If rain is forecast do not start
the construction.
Add to this list and it will be
updated
Last Updated
Saturday July 24, 2010 3:03 PM
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