Clay-sand mixtures, particularly sand-bentonite mixtures or natural expansive clay-sand mixtures, have been widely used as landfill liners as they possess very low hydraulic conductivity and adequate strength. The variations in moisture content in the vadose zone due to climatic variations, the possibility of interaction of liners with leachate, and high temperatures generated in landfills due to the decomposition of waste have all resulted in cyclic wetting and drying of landfill liners. The hydraulic and volume change behaviour of liners may be affected by these wet-dry (W-D) cycles depending on the initial placement conditions and needs a detailed examination. Therefore the work presented in this study investigates the effect of initial placement conditions on the swell and hydraulic behaviour of compacted clay-sand mixtures during cyclic W-D cycles. An artificially prepared clay-sand mixture with low sand content (32%) was selected and soil specimens were prepared under standard and modified Proctor compaction conditions. Laboratory cyclic wet-dry tests were carried out on the soil specimens under a surcharge load of 12.5 kPa using distilled water as an inundating fluid. The effect of W-D cycles on the volume change behaviour of the clay-sand mixture was found to be reduced with an increase in the specimen dry density during the initial W-D cycles. The initial hydraulic conductivity of the clay-sand mixture decreased with an increase in compaction energy due to the reduction of macropores in the soil specimens but increased as a result of wet-dry cycles.