Sand sampling below the water table using the 200 mm diameter Laval sampler

Abstract

The large-diameter Laval sampler, originally developed for sampling soft sensitive marine clays, was used to obtain samples from saturated cohesionless soil deposits. This paper describes the different operations for sampling sand deposits, which vary slightly from the conventional procedures used in clays. To preserve the fragile soil structure, the samples are frozen unidirectionally in open system conditions once at the ground surface. Field trial tests, conducted at two sites in the province of Quebec, showed that the Laval sampler successfully obtained 46 cm long samples from depths of about 6 m. Water content distribution throughout the samples showed little variation, indicating that disturbance was minimal in these large-diameter samples. Key words : sand, saturated, large sampler, freezing, performance.