Study on Masonry Soil Joint Adding Rock Salt

This study is about strengthening joints in masonry construction, commonly used in Nepal’s mountainous areas. Generally, mud mortar has been used for joints of masonry buildings in Nepal. However, after the 2015 Gorkha earthquake, the use of cement is recommended to ensure earthquake resistance, but it has not been widely used due to the high cost of the material. Therefore, we are attempting to strengthen the earthquake resistance of masonry buildings by reinforcing locally available soil with inexpensive materials. We have already reported on the joint properties using soil and lime in a separate paper. In the present paper, the addition of rock salt in addition to soil and lime has been used, and a large increase in strength was observed. Although the strength increase was more pronounced when red soil was used, the strength increase due to rock salt was also observed for other soils. This is different from the effect of lime. This paper reports the results of the strength increase when rock salt and other materials were added.