Summary
The ‘rock’ and ‘soil-like’ properties of British mudrocks are shown to be influenced by: (a) their lithology; (b) their geological history of loading (especially during exhumation); (c) the type and method of testing; and (d) the degree of weathering. In particular, unloading and weathering leads ultimately to a normally-consolidated clay of much the same undrained shear strength, irrespective of age and origin of the parent material.
For this reason, the engineering properties of the unweathered mudrocks are illustrated separately in terms of classification indices, undrained and effective shear strengths and deformability in relation to geological age.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.