Thixotropy of A Transparent Clay Manufactured by Carbopol Simulate Marine Soil

Abstract

Abstract A transparent clay manufactured by Carbopol® UltrezTM 10 (simplified as U10) was introduced, and its manufacture processes were briefly described. Both relative transparency (RT) and modulation transfer function (MTF) methods were used to quantify the optical character variation via soil thickness. The transparency of this new transparent clay was comparative analyzed with traditional four previous transparent materials. The results show that this new transparent clay has relative higher optical transparency than majority of previous materials. The thixotropic properties of this synthetic transparent clay were measured in detail through laboratory vane test. Exponential function was used to describe the thixotropy and sensitivity of clay. The good fitting results shown similar development trend of thixotropy for synthetic transparent clay and natural one. Furthermore, sensitivity of transparent clay belongs to low to medium sensitivity, which can simulate marine soil. With the test results, Carbopol® UltrezTM 10 shows a great potential as a substitute for natural clay and is expected to be widely used in model tests.