Utilisation of discarded motorcycle inner tubes as the reinforcement for embankments

Abstract

This study attempted to address the two problems of embankment stability and a growing number of discarded tyres and their associated parts such as motorcycle inner tubes. It was done by introducing woven motorcycle inner tube as reinforcement in an embankment with the aims at reducing the construction cost as well as conserving the environment. To achieve the purposes of this research the loading tests on model embankments having various configurations of reinforcement constructed under 1-G condition were conducted. The loading test results revealed that the plain embankment has the highest displacement as initially predicted. When one-layer of woven inner tubes was introduced, however, the stability was evidently improved. Furthermore, the stability was even better when two-layer of woven motorcycle inner tubes was included. Nonetheless, when three-layer of motorcycle woven inner tubes was included the displacements were very similar to those of the embankment reinforced with two-layer of woven inner tubes. This suggests that the three-layer of reinforcement is no better than those of the two-layer of reinforcement. From the test results and analyses, it may be concluded that woven motorcycle inner tubes could be employed as reinforcement to increase the stability of an embankment thereby reducing the overall construction cost as well as improving the environment.