Would you use a hydrometer result to classify silt vs clay? Or keep your analysis to strict particle size results and not infer whether the material is silt or clay?
Hi there,
I recently completed a sieve/hydrometer and Atterberg limits test on the same sample. The sieve/hydrometer classifies the material as ML with approx. 12% clay (<0.002mm) and 44% silt while the Atterberg results in LL=27, PI=8 for a CL classification. For what it's worth, checking the...
If I adjust the calculated values of Nm using Adjusted=Nm*(percent passing 0.075mm of sieve)/100, the values come out quite low with a large drop from the sieve results to the hydrometer. I guess I'm wondering if they're supposed to make a smooth looking curve or not.
I'm wondering if the sieve and hydrometer performed on the same sample should meet up smoothly when combined on a curve. Say my sieve ends at 0.075mm = 28.5% passing, but my hydrometer starts at 0.0505mm = 33.54% passing, that is quite a jump in the graph if they were combined. Am I missing...
