Search Documents

By Dempsey S. Thieman

The Kuparuk River Central Channel Bridge on the North Slope of Alaska provides critical access for oilfield service vehicles in the largest oilfield in the United States. The original sloped spill-through bridge abutments were protected by articulated concrete revetment. After 27 years of heavy service, ice impact, deep river scour, and high floods, the revetment required replacement. An OPEN CELL SHEET PILE® abutment was selected to replace the existing erosion protection and provide increased performance and structure life. Project engineers and contractors successfully addressed the challenges of low overhead sheet pile installation under the bridge, extremely heavy vehicle loads, and arctic winter construction conditions through innovative design and construction techniques. The project was successfully completed on schedule with minimal disruptions to critical bridge traffic. This paper provides a detailed discussion of the design and construction techniques utilized to address the challenges of the project, many of which could be adapted to other projects.

Jan 1, 2008

By George Machan

Bitumen coatings have been successfully used to significantly reduce downdrag on piles. Thicker coatings of "soft" bitumens can accommodate downdrag so well that very little downdrag load is transferred to the pile. Many of the case histories describe better than 80 percent downdrag load reduction. Bitumen coatings have been used on several projects in Oregon. On the Mocks Bottom Bridge project (see Reference 1), experimentation and instrumentation confirmed the viability of bitumen coatings and provided insights for design and construction. Subsequent bridge projects have used this information and have raised issues to be resolved.

Jan 1, 1989

By J. K. Mitchell

Soil improvement is examined within the context of the characteristics of different soil types, the types of ground improvement techniques that can be used to improve them, and the level of improvements that might be achieved. Several case histories are described to show how the particular soil and foundation characteristics influence the choice and success of different ground improvement techniques. Although the basic methods for soil improvement have been known for many centuries, there have been significant recent advances in the technology for their use. Time effects following the densification of cohesionless soils may lead to significant improvements in strength and stiffness. Unanticipated chemical reactions may follow stabilization using admixtures when soils for which there has been little prior experience are encountered. In some cases foundations that combine features of both ground improvement and deep foundation systems may provide good performance at reasonable cost.

Jan 1, 2010

By Edmund J. Cardoza

The Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) provides water and wastewater services to the Greater Detroit Metropolitan Area. Sewerage is treated at the DWSD Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) located at 9300 W. Jefferson Street south of the City of Detroit, Figure 1. PARTICIPANTS Engineering and design of the project for the DWSD was performed by Harza Engineering Company, Inc., C.C. Johnson & Malhotra, P.C. and their sub-consultants, including Worley Engineering and Wade Trim. The Prime Contractor is a Joint Venture of Traylor Brothers, Inc. and Jay Dee Construction. The shaft drilling and riser installation was performed by The Millgard Corporation in joint venture with the Prime Contractor (MTJD). The selection of specialized drilling equipment and the supervision and performance of the access shaft and riser installations was primarily the responsibility of The Millgard Corporation (TMC).

Jan 1, 2001

By Gianfranco Di Cicco

Seepage problems were recorded for more then 40 years at the Walter F. George lock and dam. In 2001 the Mobile district of The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers turned to the installation of a 200 feet deep cut-off in a final attempt to remedy the situation. The advertised design-built contract requested the installation of the cutoff wall in front of the concrete structure of the dam starting from 90 feet of water, cutting through a concrete lock structure, a submerged retaining wall and extending on both sides on the earthen embankments. This paper summarize the history of the project and the installation of the first recorded cut-off wall constructed under deep water, upstream to an existing dam structures and under an existing concrete lock. The technology used combined with the project's results may be considered a milestone in the marine foundation and the marine cut-off wall construction technology.

Jan 1, 2013

By Ambarish Ghosh, Subhaprasad Chakraborty

"Construction of basement floors has become necessary to meet the requirement of parking in office and residential complexes and in hospitals for radiotherapy treatment. Important projects coming up in Kolkata are mostly in closer proximity of residential buildings, office buildings and historical monuments. Sheet piling is mostly used as temporary shoring system during construction. Deep excavation in urban environment creates great problem related to construction induced vibration due to driving of sheet piles for basement, pile driving etc. which raises the chances of damage of adjacent buildings and nearby structures. Vibratory sheet-pile driving is the most common method of sheet pile installation. The knowledge of induced vibration due to this phenomenon is still very deficient. This paper presents the analysis of measured vibration data collected from different sites of Kolkata with varying soil profile. Typical two case studies of sheet pile and pile driving has been presented and the vibration values are analysed. The responses of the vibration are reported in terms of peak particle velocities (PPV). To evaluate the effects of vibration due to pile driving two aspects have been considered: the effect of the energy entering the ground from the pile and the effect of the soil condition.INTRODUCTIONIn urban areas infrastructure development projects are mainly located adjacent to existing structures like residential buildings, offices and historical structures. The construction work of such project influences the surrounding environment as well as human perception (Wiss 1981). During the construction of basement for residential complexes and hospitals sheet piling is mostly used as temporary shoring system or as to support the earth mass. The vibration induced due to driving of piles and sheet piles have been presented herein. Deep excavation projects close to existing structures increase the concern of environmental impact. For this reason the vibration assessment and prediction has become a subject of great interest. It is important to develop a site specific model for predicting the ground vibration resulting from pile and sheet pile driving at the construction sites. The developed model gives the efficacy to guide the engineer to select the construction methodology ensuring the safety of the surrounding structure. The model developed here is site specific and the parameters that has been used are dependent on the soil condition and the energy source."

Jan 1, 2015

By John Erikson, Alan J. Lutenegger, Nicholas Williams

"In order to evaluate the level of disturbance produced in clays during installation, a series of single-helix and multi-helix anchors were installed at a test site consisting of a stiff overconsolidated clay crust overlying softer near normally consolidated clay. Field vane tests were then conducted over the top of the helical plates at various depths to determine the undrained shear strength after installation and were compared with undrained shear strength measured in adjacent undisturbed ground. The tests represent the first time that the degree of installation disturbance has been evaluated directly and show that even with perfect installation practice the clay is disturbed as a result of rotation of the helices during installation. The results show that the soil is not completely remolded but that the strength is below the peak undrained strength of the adjacent undisturbed ground. Measurement of the installation torque and the rate of advance are used to define an “Installation Disturbance Factor” which may help to evaluate the quality of the installation by the Contractor and degree of soil disturbance. INTRODUCTIONAn important consideration in the design of Helical Anchors is the degree of disturbance to the soil during installation. This may be especially important for saturated fine-grained soils where the disturbance from installation may produce a reduction of the undrained shear strength. Even though this was recognized as early as 1950 by Skempton, soil disturbance is often ignored by engineers using current design procedures. Field investigations were performed to obtain both directs and indirect evaluation of the degree of disturbance produced by the installation of single-helix and multi-helix anchors in clay and the influence of disturbance on behavior. The investigations involved measurement of torque and advance during installation, load tests performed to determine load-displacement behavior and ultimate capacity and field vane tests performed over the helical anchors to evaluate changes in undrained shear strength as compared to adjacent undisturbed ground. The characteristics of the site and details of the installation are presented. Results of the field vane tests are shown for a number of helical anchor installations and results of load tests are presented. The results indicate that a reduction should be made to the undisturbed undrained shear strength for design and that the reduction may be related to the Sensitivity of the clay and quality of installation."

Jan 1, 2017

By Stefan Dahlin

The laboratory tests indicated low permeability but as I said, as a rule, the permeability in the field has been found to be higher. A high permeability has also been found when doing back calculations of rates of settlements in different cases. But as I also said, there's a need for further studies in this area.

Feb 10, 2003

By W. Morgan NeSmith

A drilled displacement pile program was utilized for the expansion of an existing power plant in Cohasset MN adjacent to the Mississippi River. The drilled displacement (DD) pile is an innovative foundation type that provides exceptional value in some geologies. In the U.S., DD piles have typically been used in coarse-grained soils due to the large friction capacities that can be generated by the piles in these conditions. This project was the first large scale experience for the project team where it was anticipated that significant portions of the DD pile capacity would be developed in primarily fine-grained soils. The project site consisted primarily of variable amounts of fill overlying predominantly low plasticity alluvial silts. In some cases, alluvial silty sand layers were encountered within the expected pile installation depths. Alluvial sands were typically encountered below the silts, in some cases within the expected pile installation depths. The project team developed a probe and pile load test program to address the variable subsurface conditions across the site. The program included monitoring various parameters (including applied torque and tool penetration rate) during the drilling portion of the pile installation using recently developed data acquisition techniques. This data was used to estimate the rig energy, or Installation Effort (IE), required for pile installation. IE profiles from the test and indicator piles were compared with subsurface data available from a number of previous site characterizations. Additionally, Cumulative IE values were compared to an in-house database of IE vs. DD Pile Capacity. Final production pile toe levels were based primarily on IE values selected from this comparison. The IE data collected during production was also used to address large variations in pile-cutoff elevation (relative to a fairly uniform ground surface elevation).

Jan 1, 2008

By Hamed Ardalan, Mohamed Ashour

"CHAPTER 1INTRODUCTIONThe use of piles to stabilize active landslides or to prevent instability in currently stable slopes has become one of the most important innovative slope reinforcement techniques over the last few decades. Piles have been used successfully in many situations in order to stabilize slopes or to improve slope stability, and numerous methods have been developed for the analysis of piled slopes (Ito et al., 1981; Poulos, 1995; Chen and Poulos, 1997; Zeng and Liang, 2002; Won et al., 2005).The piles used in slope stabilization are usually subjected to lateral force through horizontal movements of the surrounding soil; hence they are considered to be passive piles. The interaction behavior between the piles and the soil is a complicated phenomenon due to its 3-dimensional nature and can be influenced by many factors, such as the characteristics of deformation and the strength parameters of both the pile and the soil. The interaction among piles installed in a slope is complex and depends on the pile and soil strength and stiffness properties, the length of the pile that is embedded in unstable (sliding) and stable soil layers, and the center-to-center pile spacing (S) in a row. Furthermore, the earth pressures applied to the piles are highly dependent upon the relative movement of the soil and the piles."

Jan 1, 2013

By Ping Yang, Tian-bin Li, Min-hui Wu

"The process of filtrate loss of low solid-phase drilling fluid at different content of polyanionic cellulose is investigated by the standard filtration test. The test results showed that when time of filtration is same, the filtrate volume decreases linearly with the increase of content of polyanionic cellulose. When content of polyanionic cellulose is same, the velocity of filter loss decreases nonlinearly with the increase of time and the velocity of filter loss will reach a stable value. The filtrate volume in 7 to 8 minutes can reach half of the total filtrate volume. At the same time, the velocity of filter loss of drilling fluid decreases nonlinearly with the increase of viscosity. When apparent viscosity is between 3.5~4.15 mPa.s, decrease speed of velocity of filter loss is quick. The results are helpful for characteristics evaluation of filtrate loss of drilling fluid and control of filtrate loss.IntroductionDuring the process of drilling, water of drilling fluid can leakage into stratum, the water can result in instability and collapse of borehole wall. At the same time, the original ratio of drilling fluid will change. The density of drilling fluid will increase, the performance of the drilling fluid will change. Controlling amount of filtration is important to drill successfully. The additives of controlling filtrate loss are mainly two types, particle materials and polymer materials. High-molecular polymer is a kind of high-molecular material, has the adsorption effect, high polymer protection, can improve the advantages of slurry viscosity (Xu,2004 and Dehghanpour,2001). Some scholars carried out some study on the polymer material fluid loss agent in recent years, these study mainly focused on CMC, HEC, MHEC, CMHEC, starch and its derivatives(Zhang,2005 and Chevron,2009).About PAC (polyanionic cellulose) as drilling mud additives, a few of scholars carried out some relevant work. Plank (1992) applied PAC into ordinary freshwater drilling fluid and analyzed temperature stability of freshwater drilling fluid. Bennion (2000) applied PAC into drilling fluid and analyzed effect of polyanionic cellulose on strata inhibitory. Huang (2011) analyzed effect of PAC on properties of the high-density water-based drilling fluid. Mahto (2004) applied PAC into fresh water and salt-water drilling fluid and analyzed effect of PAC on rheological properties of the drilling fluid. Wang (2008) applied PAC into alkaline drilling fluid to study various performance of drilling fluid. PAC is a renewable resource and has good application prospect (Ankara, 2005). So it is very important to understand the effect of PAC on filtration process of drilling fluid.The test was conducted by changing the content of the PAC in drilling fluid. The object of this paper is to understand effect of polyanionic cellulose on filtration process of the low solid-phase drilling fluid."

Jan 1, 2017

By Ali Porbaha

In today's fast-track construction environment, owners are searching for non-conventional technologies to build their projects faster and safer while maintaining traffic flow during construction. To that end designers and contractors are providing solutions that incorporate many unique features to expedite construction processes. In addition to timely delivery of the finished highway products, there is an increasing interest in making the initial investment in applying innovative technologies and thereby minimizing costly maintenance of highway projects. Accordingly, the aim of this paper (along with the accompanying paper) is to examine innovative technologies, developed mostly in Europe, that accelerate construction of highway, runway and railway embankment foundations. For each technology, a basic concept, installation technique(s), and design considerations are discussed, along with the case history of a real-world project. The Geotextile Encased Columns (GEC), AuGeo, and Continuous Flight Auger (CFA) are presented in Part I. Deep Mixing (DM), Cut-Mix-Injection (FMI), Mass stabilization, and Combined soil Stabilization with Vertical columns (CSV) technologies are discussed in Part II.

Jan 1, 2002

By KeerthiRaaj Subrmanian, Muthukkumaran Kasinathan

"A railway embankment is under construction between Nagapattinam to Thiruthuraipoondi covering 36.5 km. The sub-soil strata comprises of soft clay extending up to 10 m below existing ground level, which is subjected to stability and settlement problems. A trial stretch covering about 5 kilometer was improved using Prefabricated Vertical Drains (PVD) with surcharge was recommended to accelerate the consolidation settlement. The geotechnical characteristics of the subsoil are examined through laboratory tests on representative soil samples. Recent improvement in the finite element analysis has facilitated modeling of PVD in finite element software for computing the settlement magnitude and time rate of consolidation. In this study the theoretically predicted settlement magnitude and time rate of consolidation from Terzaghi.s vertical consolidation, Barron's radial consolidation are compared with the analyzed FEM results for both the cases with and without PVD improved embankment. The comparative analysis between FEM and predicted data hold good for stresses and the associated deformations. The excess pore water pressure was significantly lower and their dissipation was faster in case of embankment with vertical drains. Thus PLAXIS 2D tool shows fairly convincing results in comparison to the theoretical solutions.1. INTRODUCTIONFrom the earlier times civilization has been developed in a fashion either at the banks of river or near to the shore region, because of the easier availability of food and water. This over centuries made them as huge cities, consequently population rise made the increased necessity of highway, railways, port and even more ground for construction. As a stake researchers are pushed to make a low bearing ground into a massive carrier of skyscrapers, embankment, bridges etc. These low bearing ground suffers from total and differential settlement, slope instability. Hence, numerous ground improvement techniques were followed to eradicate these concerns which include preloading, piling, stone column, vertical drains and geosynthetic reinforcement. Among them Prefabricated vertical drain (PVD) are often used to accelerate consolidation of soft subsoil and has been the main soil improvement method used in improving the soft marine clay deposit (Chu et al.(2004); Chai (2001) and Arulrajah et al.(2003)). Literature review of embankment over soft clay deposit reveals that combination of PVD with preloading is widely considered as an economical and less time consuming ground improvement technique."

Jan 1, 2015

By Paul J. Lewis

Replacement of the Monroe Street Viaduct in southwest Baltimore City, Maryland included transforming 240 feet of the south approach from a pile-supported multi-span bridge to a mechanically stabilized earth (MSE) embankment supported by vibro-concrete columns (VCCs) and a load transfer platform. The project area was underlain with highly compressible soils which would have resulted in up to 18 inches of settlement under the proposed embankment load. Adjacent structures and critical underground utilities would have been impacteded or damaged by this settlement. Various load transfer alternatives were evaluated to mitigate the anticipated settlement by supporting the embankment on a deeper, more competent stratum. The alternatives considered included compaction grout columns, stone columns, deep soil mixing, and VCCs. Deep soil mixing was eventually selected for design, however, as part of a value engineering proposal, the general contractor Joseph B. Fay Company, with assistance from Hayward Baker and the Collin Group, prepared and submitted an alternative consisting of VCCs. This paper presents the details of the value load transfer platform and VCC design. Loading tests were utilized to confirm the VCC capacity and field changes were implemented based on the test results.

Jan 1, 2007

By Cau T. Bui

Thanks to Doi-moi (renovation) policy, many great bridges were constructed in Vietnam to meet demands of her booming economy in the recent decade and deep foundation structures were the only alternatives for the foundations of these great bridges. The deep foundation structures were constructed by modern technologies and almost of all these deep foundation structures were designed by foreign companies and carried out by Vietnamese workers and engineers under supervision of foreign experts. Beside successes, there were several failure cases in which the collapse of temporary scaffolding system of Can-tho Cable ? Stayed Bridge due to settlement of its pile foundation killing 54 workers and seriously injuring 80 other workers was the most serious. This paper introduces construction techniques of the deep foundation structures applied to building of great bridges in Vietnam recently. It will especially focus on two failure cases: 1) collapse of temporary scaffolding system of Can-tho Cable ? Stayed Bridge due to settlement of its pile foundation and 2) failure of drilled shaft foundation of Thanh-tri bridge due to poor construction technique and management. These two failure cases were greatly concerned by both bridge specialists and the public. Reasons of and lessons from these two failure cases will be carefully discussed. From the two failure cases, this paper will draw some lessons that should be important issues to be seriously paid attention when designing and constructing deep foundations in Vietnam.

Jan 1, 2008

By Andrew Baxter

The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas is a beautiful glass and concrete structure cut into a valley that mingles with water ponds spanned by multiple bridges with suspended roofs. Or, at least it will be when completed in 2009. At Crystal Bridges, most of the proposed buildings involve cuts up to 50 ft high to be retained by the building structures. This requires the construction of retaining walls adequately founded to support lateral loads of up to 70 kip/ft. To add to this difficulty, the site is within a karst region with all the variability and irregularities associated with solutioning and erosion of the parent rock in this environment. The irregular rock profile made it virtually impossible to conceive a predictable arrangement of shallow footings and shear keys for the retaining walls. The existence of layers of soft soils within a hard rock formation made a caisson foundation impractical. The authors developed an innovative solution based on micropiles, which proved to be invaluable from a cost and schedule point of view. In areas where rock was shallow, micropiles were used as ?shear pins? to transfer the horizontal loads to the rock. In areas with significant overburden, a system of vertical and battered micropiles was devised to carry vertical and horizontal loads from the retaining walls. This paper presents a detailed description of the design and installation of the micropiles used as shear pins, and includes the results of lateral load tests performed on full-scale models of the grade beams on shear pins. The work performed shows that micropiles in rock can be effectively utilized for support of significant lateral loads provided that an adequate arrangement of suitably sized micropiles is provided, and that micropiles used as shear pins may develop significant tensile stresses when loaded laterally.

Jan 1, 2008

By C. Guney Olgun, Fleur Loveridge, Tracy Brettmann, William Powrie

"Abstract Deep foundations are increasingly being used, not just to carry structural loads, but also to act as heat exchangers as part of a ground source heat pump system. Such foundations, often called energy piles, have the potential to make significant contributions towards meeting the heating and cooling demands of buildings, thus reducing the overall energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions during their lifespan. To ensure that the available energy from these systems is maximized, it is important to determine the thermal conductivity of the surrounding soils, a key design input parameter. In situ thermal response tests are commonly used to carry out this task for small diameter borehole heat exchangers. However, there has been debate over the applicability of these tests to energy piles due to their larger diameter and the consequent increased influence of the pile thermal properties on the test outcome. This paper examines the results of three thermal response tests carried out on piles of different diameters and thermal properties installed at the same site in Texas. Transient analysis of the test results, combined with comparisons to laboratory testing of soil samples from the site, is used to given an indication of the applicability of the thermal response test over different timescales for the different piles. It is concluded that the test is most suited to smaller diameter piles constructed with lower thermal diffusivity materials. Recommendations are given for the conduction of pile thermal response tests and interpretation of test data.INTRODUCTIONAs issues of energy security and scarcity become more important, the use of ground source heat pumps to provide renewable and sustainable heating and cooling to buildings is set to increase. Traditionally such systems use special purpose ground heat exchangers to extract and/or inject heat from/into the ground. The heat exchangers comprise a series of plastic pipes cast into the ground and then connected to the heat pump via a series of header pipes. In the case of building space heating, the heat pump then steps up the temperature difference to deliver the extracted heat at a useable level. However, financial and carbon savings can result by utilizing the building foundations as heat exchangers as well as to carry the building structural loads.Piles, often termed “energy piles”, are the most common type of foundation heat exchanger, and their construction has been increasing in recent years (Amis et al, 2009). However, while energy piles have the potential to make significant contributions towards meeting building heating and cooling demands, there remains scope for improving their thermal efficiency through improved analysis approaches (e.g. Loveridge & Powrie, 2013). In fact the greater diameter of many energy piles means they have the potential to deliver increased short term thermal energy storage compared to more commonly installed borehole heat exchangers."

Jan 1, 2014

By James C. Scott

Compression and tension load testing were performed on bored concrete piles installed to depths of 18 to 34 meters below excavation levels for a large mixed-use development in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The 900 mm diameter piles were installed in weathered graphitic schist bedrock. Load testing confirmed the side shear and end bearing capacities of the piles. The work formed part of the investigations for the 56,000 m2 site which includes a 79-story office tower, hotel tower, apartment tower, retail complex, and plaza area underlain by 4 to 6 basement levels. The paper provides the results of the site investigations, pile-load testing procedures, pile-load settlement behavior, and shaft load distribution.

Jan 1, 2007

By Alain Pecker

The choice of a design concept for a bridge foundation is guided by various factors; several of these factors are indeed of technical origin, like the environmental conditions in a broad sense, but others non technical factors may also have a profound impact on the final design concept. The foundations solutions adopted for the Rion Antirion bridge are described and an attempt is made to pinpoint the major factors that have guided the final choices. The Rion Antirion bridge is exemplar in that respect: the foundation concept combines the simplicity of capacity design, the conceptual facility of construction and enhances the foundation safety. The design of these foundations was a very challenging task which required full cooperation and close interaction with all the parties involved: concessionaire, contractor, designers and design checker.

Jan 1, 2013

By Jakub Szary

Excavation and shoring adjacent to the above-grade Gilmore train station and elevated guideway was undertaken in 2019. A perimeter secant pile cut-off wall was constructed to a depth 37 m (121 ft) below ground surface consisting of 1.0 m (3.3 ft) diameter drilled piles spaced 750 mm (2.5 ft) on-center, tied back with soil anchors, and reinforced with W610 steel sections every 4th pile. A bracing/jacking system was also constructed to support 3 free-standing guideway caissons within the excavation. An automated instrumentation program was installed to monitor movements of shoring walls and train infrastructure in real time and consisted of a robotic total station, inclinometers, tiltmeters, strain gauges, extensometers, and anchor load cells. Baseline monitoring was able to establish diurnal and seasonal movements within the structure, strongly correlated with temperature. The system actively monitored various shoring elements and train infrastructure in real time and alerted the project team when values exceeded predetermined threshold values. Remote reconfiguration of the automated system allowed for more frequent monitoring during jacking of Pier 29 in March 2022. Monitoring data was in agreeance with on-site manual surveying results and jacking dial gauges, and proved to be a reliable monitoring system for construction applications.

Sep 1, 2022