TY - JOUR T1 - Impacts of Test Conditions, Soil Organic Matter, Clay and Calcium Carbonate Contents on Mean Weight Diameter and Tensile Strength of Aggregates of Some Hamedan Soils TT - تأثیر شرایط آزمایش، مقدار ماده آلی، رس و کربنات کلسیم خاک بر میانگین وزنی قطر و مقاومت کششی خاکدانه ها در برخی از خاک های استان همدان JF - JCPP JO - JCPP VL - 12 IS - 44 UR - http://jcpp.iut.ac.ir/article-1-874-en.html Y1 - 2008 SP - 123 EP - 134 KW - Soil structural stability KW - Wet sieving KW - Brazilian test KW - Matric suction KW - Soil texture KW - Organic matter KW - Calcium carbonate N2 - Soil physical and chemical properties, and test conditions might affect soil structural stability. In this study, the effects of test conditions as well as intrinsic soil properties on structural stability were investigated for selected soils from Hamedan Province. Mean weight diameter (MWD) and tensile strength (Y) of aggregates were determined by wet sieving method and indirect Brazilian test, respectively. The soil samples were pre-wetted slowly to matric suction of 200 kPa before the wet sieving. The pre-wetted samples were wet-sieved for 5, 10 and 15 min in order to simulate different hydro-mechanical stresses imposed on soil structure. Tensile strength of soil aggregates were also measured at air-dry and 500 kPa matric suction conditions. Short duration shaking (i.e. 5 min) could effectively discriminate the Hamedan soils in terms of structural stability due to their fairly low aggregate stabilities. The soil organic matter content had the highest impact on MWD followed by both clay and CaCO3 content. The same was true for the Y values i.e. OM played the highest role in mechanical strength of soil aggregates. The highest coefficient of determination (R2) was obtained between Y and the intrinsic soil properties for matric suction of 500 kPa. The organic matter content had an important role in water and mechanically stable soil aggregates. The results indicated that short-duration wet sieving (i.e. 5 min) and measurements of tensile strength at matric suction of 500 kPa could be recommended for aggregate stability assessment in Hamedan soils M3 ER -