Pore water density in a saturated bentonite

This paper reports the average pore water density (ρ wp ) measured on a Japanese bentonite, which was compacted to a dry density (ρ d ) range from 0·3 to 1·8 Mg/m 3 and saturated under a water pressure of 2·7 MPa. It was found that ρ wp monotonically increased from ∼1·0 Mg/m 3 at ρ d of 0·3 Mg/m 3 to ∼1·23 Mg/m 3 at ρ d of 1·8 Mg/m 3 . A review of the available literature revealed that the methodology of accurately measuring ρ wp in a full range of water content (w) is not available. An upper boundary of ρ wp for montmorillonite was drawn, and proportions of water at different swelling states were estimated.