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Jan 1, 1994

By M. D. Riegel, Brian T. Felber

"Construction of foundation elements in an urban environment is often complicated by multiple constraints such as existing foundations, utility conflicts, maintenance and protection of traffic on high volume roadways, low overhead clearances, and vibration and displacement monitoring to reduce risks of impact to existing facilities. Micropiles are commonly a preferred foundation alternative in an urban setting to mitigate some of these risks. This paper presents examples in which micropiles helped reduce risk in an urban setting on the two subject infrastructure improvement projects. The case studies presented include the Verrazano Narrows Bridge HOV and Bus Ramp Improvements in Brooklyn, NY and the Kosciuszko Bridge Replacement in Queens and Brooklyn, NY. The paper details the micropile design, how risks were mitigated, and the complications to each of these projects associated with the urban setting.INTRODUCTIONThe paper begins with background information about the Verrazano Narrows Bridge HOV and Bus Ramp Improvements Project, followed by background information for the Kosciuszko Bridge Replacement Project. This introductory background information is followed by discussion of the urban site constraints, which controlled the foundation type selection for both projects. In closing, the paper discusses the micropile design process, load testing, and construction.VERRAZANO NARROWS BRIDGE HOV & BUS RAMP IMPROVEMENTS BACKGROUNDProject ScopeThe project consists of two new ramps; one designated for HOV / Bus traffic between Staten Island and the Gowanus Expressway, and one to be utilized for storing the barrier transfer vehicle. Also included is the complete reconstruction of Ramps B and F to accommodate horizontal and vertical alignment clearances from the new ramps, removal of the median of the upper level to add one lane, utilities improvements, stormwater improvements, and miscellaneous structural repairs. The new HOV / Bus Ramp was designed for reversible traffic flow to accommodate the demand of the peak traffic direction by movable barrier.Geotechnical / Foundation Engineering ScopeThe geotechnical work included a desk study review of existing plans, geotechnical reports, and geologic maps. This data was subsequently supplemented with a subsurface exploration program. Once completed, foundation design was performed for 25 proposed bridge substructures. Four existing battered pilesupported foundations and two shallow foundations were evaluated for increased loading. Upon completion of the foundation design, foundation plans, specifications, and an engineer’s estimate were prepared. Foundation installation was observed on a part-time as needed basis."

Jan 1, 2016

By Arash Khosravifar

The seismic design of extended pile shafts for the combined effects of dynamic shaking and liquefaction-induced lateral spreading is investigated using nonlinear dynamic finite element analyses (NDA). Results of NDA parameter studies are used to illustrate how inertia and lateral spreading loads combine during shaking. The NDA results are used to evaluate equivalent static analysis (ESA) methods. Implications for design practice are discussed.

Jan 1, 2010

By Willie M. NeSmith

Cast-in-place piling are a staple of the deep foundation industry, and are used (in various forms) worldwide. In assessing the application of cast-in-place piles, it is of value to reflect on the development of the various systems, in order to understand how the current processes and equipment came to be. This paper traces the evolution of the cast-in-place industry. Emphasis is on developments in the United States; however, since there has been a substantial fusion of US and European processes, notable European developments are also discussed.

Jan 1, 2006

By Edward Jacobsen, Patrick J. Lydon

"The ongoing expansion of the Oak Creek Power Plant in Oak Creek, Wisc., includes a tunnel bored in rock that connects to four vertical intake shafts approximately 1.5 miles (2.4 km) offshore in Lake Michigan. In 2004, Case Foundation Company was awarded a lump sum contract to install these intake shafts. In spite of delays that shortened the May to September construction season by up to 50%, four shafts and liner assemblies were drilled in 2005 and 2006. The shafts were connected to the tunnel in 2007 by mining upward to reach the lower portion of each liner and then removing its internal bulkheads so that lake water fl owed into the tunnel. The project is one of the largest private construction projects ever undertaken in Wisconsin. The expansion adds 1,230 megawatts of generation. In addition to the tunnel and offshore work, there will be 16 miles (26 km) of railroad track and 6 million cubic yards (4,600,000 m3) of earth work. The 27 ft (8.2 m) diameter tunnel, drilled some 150 ft (46 m) below the surface of Lake Michigan, originates onshore at a pump house. A structural slurry wall was constructed as the foundation for the pump house. The tunnel passes to the south near the current water intake before bearing east toward the new offshore intake shafts, which are 12 ft (3.6 m) diameter by 108 ft (33 m) long steel liner assemblies. These were grouted in place from approximately 3 ft (1 m) above the crown of the intake tunnel and then to 20 ft (6 m) below the lake bottom.Site GeologyOffshore. The plant site is north of the Racine-Milwaukee county line in an area affected by glacial activity. The soil conditions encountered at each shaft location were consistent, with noticeable variations occurring in the top of rock elevations that sloped downward from the innermost to the outermost shaft."

Jan 1, 2008

By Michael Hughes, Selva Selvamohan, Ray Costa

"Cutoff walls are commonly used to mitigate underseepage problems for levee remediation projects. At abrupt changes in seepage cutoff wall depths there is a potential for water to flow around the back of the deeper cutoff wall leading to elevated seepage pressures on the landside that could result in exit gradients exceeding design criteria. This condition is referred to as end-around-effects and is a complex problem that requires detailed and time consuming 3-D numerical modeling to represent accurately. This paper presents a simple approach for assessing end-around-effects using the results of 2- D seepage analysis to determine if lateral extension of the deeper portion of the cutoff wall is required. This simplified approach provides a pragmatic solution to a complex 3-D problem. The presented procedure was used as part of the Feather River West Levee Project in Yuba City, California, to assess end-around-effects at 26 locations. The results showed that wall extensions of up to 100 feet were needed at only 2 locations.INTRODUCTIONAs the lead geotechnical consultant for the Feather River West Levee Project, AECOM were responsible for designing levee remediation works for approximately 35 miles of levee protecting the area around Yuba City, California, and communities to the north and south. Due to land use constraints, seepage cutoff walls were the main remediation alternative selected to address underseepage issues for the project.As part of the design review process, the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) requested AECOM to look at 26 locations along the levee alignment where the depth of cutoff wall changed abruptly from shallow to deep, or vice versa. At these locations there was the potential for seepage pressures to pass behind the deeper section of cutoff wall and stress the blanket layer landward of the cutoff wall. A condition referred to as end-around-effects.End-around-effects involve complex 3-D ground conditions that have traditionally been addressed by laterally extending the deeper section of cutoff wall an arbitrary distance based solely on engineering judgment. In discussions with DWR, AECOM developed a simple procedure to provide a more objective assessment of end-around-effects without the need for detailed and time consuming analysis. This procedure allows the engineer to make an informed decision of whether end-around-effects are a problem at the location of a cutoff wall transition rather than laterally extending the deeper section of cutoff wall an arbitrary distance based on engineering judgment alone."

Jan 1, 2015

By Janaka J. Kumara, Takashi Kurashina, Yoshiaki Kikuchi, Takahiro Yajima

"The inner frictional resistance of open-ended piles depend heavily on the degree of soil plugging. Many factors including pile diameter, relative density and end conditions of the piles influence the degree of soil plugging. In this paper, the effects of inner sleeves attached at the pile base on the inner frictional resistance are discussed. The experiments were conducted on a medium-dense sandy ground using smallscale model piles. The results suggest that the inner frictional resistance is influenced by sleeve height for 50 mm diameter piles although it is independent for 30 mm diameter piles. The results also indicate that soil plug height is influenced by the sleeve height. The results of the incremental filling ratio (IFR) showed that penetration of non-sleeved piles is closer to unplugged state than the sleeved piles. The results of the IFR also reveal that the degree of soil plugging is affected by the sleeve height for 50 mm diameter piles although the variation is very limited in 30 mm diameter piles. The results on the coefficient of lateral earth pressure suggested that it increases from 1.08 – 1.75 when the sleeve height is increased from 10 – 100 mm for 50 mm diameter piles.INTRODUCTIONPrevious studies have shown that the behaviour of open-ended piles is different from closed-ended piles (Szechy, 1961; Randolph et al., 1979; Paikowsky and Whitman, 1990). Open-ended driven piles are widely used for deep foundations, in particular in offshore deep foundations. Generally, it is accepted that a short open-ended pile produces a smaller bearing capacity than a similar closed-ended pile (Nauroy and Tirant, 1983). However, a long open-ended pile can produce a similar bearing capacity as a closed-ended pile due to a large inner frictional resistance mobilised between the inner pile shaft and inner soil (Lehane and Randolph, 2002). The ultimate bearing capacity of an open-ended pile, Qu consists of three components as given in Eq. 1."

Jan 1, 2017

Jan 1, 1997

Jan 1, 2001

By Sunil S. Basarkar, Dilip M. Dewaikar, Rajesh H. Gajjar

"A load transfer program AXPILE was developed for simulation of the loadmovement characteristics of socketed piles of the Mumbai reg ion. This program used empirical relationships for ultimate shaft resistance at pile-rock interface recommended by Zhang and Einstein (1998). According to their recommendation, ultimate shaft resistance at pile-rock interface is related to the square-root of uniaxial compressive strength of intact socket material by a parameter C, which ranges from 0.4 for smooth sockets to 0.8 for rough sockets. Results of three instrumented pile load tests were compared with the AXPILE generated results. The comparison of analytical and field estimates of the unit shaft resistance confirm the recommendations of Zhang and Einstein (1998) on the unit side shear parameter c,, which was found to be in the range of 0.35 to 0.67.INTRODUCTIONInstrumented pile load tests were carried out on the test piles at the Bandra-Worli sea link project in Mumbai city of western India. High capacity socketed piles were required to take up loads from the superstructure. Hence, in addition to the available toe resistance, an accurate measurement of the shaft resistance in socket portion was desired. The instrumented load tests incorporated Osterbergcell (0-cell) assisted by strain gauge instrumentation to estimate the shaft resistance mobilization in the socket portion.AXPILE load transfer program was developed for load-movement simulation of socketed piles (Basarkar, 2004). The load transfer algorithm based on Coyle and Reese (1966) was incorporated in this program, which used empirical correlations and functions to account for load transfer in piles through shaft and toe resistance.This paper compares the computed unit shaft resistance from the AXPILE program with the measured values recorded from the instrumented pile load test."

Jan 1, 2005

By B. Soundara, A. Suganya, S. Selvakumar

"Expansive soils have a potential for shrinkage or swelling under changing moisture content. Attempts were made to reduce the swelling potential of expansive soils with conventional additives such as lime, cement, etc. and non-conventional additives such as industrial wastes. In this research an attempt is made to study the feasibility of using granulated waste expanded polystyrene (EPS) as an additive to expansive soil to control swelling. To investigate the effect of mixing waste EPS granules with expansive clays, three expansive soils with different plasticity index were manufactured in the laboratory by mixing sand with sodium bentonite of various proportions. A series of standard proctor test, California bearing ratio (CBR) test, one dimensional free swell and swell pressure tests were performed on these soils. Test results show that the inclusion of EPS granules significantly reduces the percent swell and swelling pressure when subjected to one-dimensional free swell conditions. The dry density and CBR values decrease with increase in EPS content and increased plasticity of the soil.INTRODUCTIONExpansive soils cover an area of about 257 Million hectares on the earth’s surface (Dudal et al. 1965). In India, the area covered by expansive soils is nearly 20 percent of the total area (Mohan et al. 1961). Movement is usually in an uneven pattern and of such a magnitude as to cause extensive damage to various structures, especially lightly loaded structures or pavements (Chen 1975). Stabilization is one of the methods of treating the expansive soils to make them fit for civil engineering purposes. The variety of stabilizers may be broadly divided into three groups (Petry et al. 2002): (a) traditional stabilizers (lime, cement etc.), (b) by-product stabilizers (fly ash, quarry dust, phosphor-gypsum, slag etc.) and (c) non-traditional stabilizers (sulfonated oils, potassium compounds, polymer, enzymes, ammonium chlorides etc.). Apart from these, a number of other ground improvement techniques such as sand cushion technique (Satyanarayana 1966); cohesive nonswelling (CNS) layer technique (Katti 1978) were adopted for the stabilization of expansive soils. Expanded polystyrene (EPS) is a polymeric foam normally available in white colour and is a wellknown packaging material. The geotechnical specialists recognize EPS as the most commonly used geofoam material, a type of cellular geosynthetic which has been in consistent use in geotechnical applications since the early 1960s (Horvath 1995). EPS has very low thermal conductivity and nearly 98% of the volume is air (Lye et al. 2002). EPS has many exceptional properties such as being lightweight, thermal insulating, shock-absorbing and having low-water pick-up, etc. EPS find its applications in geotechnical engineering as light weight fills in the form of blocks (Refsdal 1985, Karpurapu et al. 1992, Zou 2001, Ikizler et al. 2008). EPS can be used as compressible inclusion and as a vibration damper (Horvath, 1994&1995). EPS is also used in lightweight concrete owing to its lightweight, excellent heat preservation and sound insulation properties (Ravindrarajah et al. 1994; Miledet al. 2004 and Babu et al. 2005). Waste EPS granules have been used in with horticultural soils to improve a number of soil characteristics like improving drainage, lightening heavy soils and improving water uptake capacity of soils (Scheirs 1998). Furthermore, it was also used as sub-base materials for pavements and railway track beds (Hanna 1978; Duskov1996), construction materials for floating marine structures and fenders in offshore oil platforms (Bagon et al. 1976), sea beds and sea fences; as an energy absorbing material for buried military structures, (Perry et al. 1991)."

Jan 1, 2017

By Ahmad F. Souri, Murad Abu-Farsakh

"In this study, the static lateral resistance of vertical and battered pile groups was analyzed using 3D finite element analysis. The battered pile group finite element model was verified using the results from a case study performed on the M19 pier foundation of the I-10 twin span bridge in Louisiana. The vertical pile group model was created by adjusting pile inclinations of the verified battered pile group model. The finite element models utilized nonlinear constitutive models for materials behavior and a soil-pile interface model. The results showed that the battered pile group had greater lateral resistance than the vertical pile group with 60-70% lower pile cap displacement. The largest lateral load share was found in the middle rows in the battered pile group, while it was in the leading row for the vertical. The soil resistance profiles showed that the vertical pile group mobilized greater soil resistance compared to the battered pile group.INTRODUCTIONThe lateral resistance of a pile-soil system depends on both pile stiffness and soil reaction. The soil reaction is a nonlinear function of deflection, depth, pile stiffness, and soil stiffness and strength. The lateral capacity of single piles is evaluated at the maximum deflection limit, and can be predicted using established methods such as the p-y curve method (e.g., Matlock 1970, Reese et al. 1974), elastic solution by Poulos and Davis (1980), the strain wedge model (Ashour et al. 2004), and the finite element method (e.g., Yang and Jeremic 2002, Comodromos and Pitilakis 2005, Isenhower et al. 2014). For pile groups, the lateral capacity of a pile-in-group is less than the isolated single pile case because the soil in front of the pile-in-group is weakened by the overlap of stress zones from surrounding piles. The latter is referred to as the shadowing or group effect (Fig. 1). Prediction of the lateral capacity for pile groups is based on the p-y curve method for single piles with the use of empirical factors called “p-multipliers”. The p-multipliers accounts for the shadowing effect, and are a function of pile-pile spacing and soil type (e.g., Brown et al. 1987, 1988, McVay et al. 1995). Moreover, the lateral capacity of pile groups is also influenced by vertical load, piles arrangement, and slenderness ratio (e.g., Rao et al. 1998, Patra and Pise 2001, Ilyas et al. 2004, Hussien et al. 2012).Battered piles refer to piles installed at an angle with respect to the vertical to increase their lateral capacity. The greater lateral resistance is achieved by the additional axial reaction in the pile. Battered piles are called “negative battered” when inclined in the load direction, and “positive battered” when inclined opposite to the load direction (Fig. 1). Previous studies concluded that the lateral resistance is highest in positive battered piles followed by negative battered and vertical piles, respectively (Murthy 1964, Meyerhof and Yalcin 1993, Zhang et al. 1999)."

Jan 1, 2017

By Packer M. L

Residual load development in driven precast piles has been widely researched in recent decades, however, cast-in-situ piles are often falsely assumed to be unaffected by this mechanism. In contrast to driven precast piles, driven cast-in-situ (DCIS) piles require adequate time prior to loading for the concrete hydration and curing processes to occur. The concrete-soil interaction is complex with several processes influencing the strains within the concrete pile after installation. DCIS piles are of particular interest given that residual loads can be developed during both the driving and casting phases. This paper present four instrumented end-bearing DCIS piles in which temperature and strains were monitored from installation, with the objective of identifying the processes contributing to the measured strains prior to testing. Strain gauges at all depths recorded a net compression and compressive strains continued to increase up to the commencement of load testing. Residual strains in the test piles were interpreted to be influenced by temperature (concrete and ambient soil and air temperature), consolidation of soils due to dissipation of excess pore water pressure, and swelling from absorption of groundwater. Several residual load interpretive methods are evaluated with the Siegel and McGillivray (2009) approach being consistent with the skin friction full mobilisation theory of the Unified Design method. The full-scale field tests presented herein provide a unique opportunity to examine DCIS pile behaviour, particularly given the lack of presently available published studies on these pile types.

May 1, 2022

By Matteo Montesi

Deep foundation elements are often used as discrete elements in externally supported earth retaining structures such as soldier piles and lagging walls, secant/tangent pile walls, anchored walls, etc. These structures can be designed using different approaches such as conventional limit equilibrium methods, finite element/difference analyses, and soil spring (p-y) analyses which are contained in various commercially available computer programs used by engineers worldwide. Although these programs usually undergo various degree of verification and validation, users must be aware of each program’s limitations and conditions in which each design approach should or should not be used. These programs may incur difficulties when non-continuous deep foundation elements are used as part of the retaining system and in cases of non-uniform geometry where closed-form solutions are not available. Design input parameters such as passive arching width, wall-to-soil friction, and p-multipliers (pm) are not always given enough attention which may result in potential design deficiencies. This paper presents the main features of various earth retaining structure design approaches and discusses their advantages/disadvantages. The paper addresses some of the limitations and difficulties that may be faced with when utilizing non-continuous discrete deep foundation elements and identifies key elements that are sources of potential deficiencies and errors. An example comparing the design outcomes using different design approaches is presented. INTRODUCTION Earth retaining structures are used to retain soil and create or maintain a difference in ground elevation between grades in front and behind the retaining structure. Deep foundation elements have been used for decades to support earth retaining structures. Earth retaining structures that are supported by deep foundation elements are typically referred to as externally stabilized system (O’Rourke and Jones, 1990). An externally stabilized system uses an external structural element, in contrast to internally stabilized systems which rely on reinforcements installed within and extending beyond the potential failure mass. The design of externally supported retaining structures can be accomplished using different approaches, which can be challenging under certain conditions. Each approach has been discussed extensively in available literature, and is well summarized in the and Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) guidelines. The objective of this paper is to present the most widely used design approaches and discuss their limitations and difficulties in one concise and brief document, giving the reader a good source for comprehensive understanding of the various design approaches, supported by a technical example. This paper is not intended to be a comprehensive review of all available design methods and formulations available in the literature.

Jan 1, 2018

By Riad Diab

In 2018 the Caisse de Dépôt et Placement du Québec (CDPQ) awarded a $6.3 billion (U.S. dollars) design-build contract to the Joint Venture (JV) team NouvLR for the design and construction of one of the largest automated transportation systems in the world, called the Réseau express métropolitain (REM). The REM project is a 67 km (41.6 mi) light rail system with 26 stations linking downtown, the airport and the greater Montreal area in Canada. Out of the 67 km (41.6 mi) network, over 25 km (15.5 mi) is being constructed on a 650- span elevated structure founded on single drilled shafts socketed into rock. Optimizing the design of the drilled shafts was one of the main objectives of the geotechnical team, as it would likely result in shorter shafts that help significantly reduce the project costs. As part of the optimization process, three static axial load tests and two fully instrumented lateral load tests were performed, during the preliminary design phase, on sacrificial shafts to simulate the ultimate load level and validate construction procedures.

May 1, 2022

By Muhannad T. Suleiman

Temperatures below freezing significantly enhance the soil shear strength and stiffness and to a lesser extent increase the compressive strength of concrete as well as the yield and ultimate strength of reinforcing steel. Consequently, the lateral load resistance of bridge columns supported by drilled shafts becomes dependent on seasonal weather conditions. To investigate the effects of seasonal freezing on the behavior of bridge columns supported by drilled shafts, large-scale field lateral load tests were conducted at 23°C (73.4°F) and -10°C (14°F) on two identical units at an field test site, which consisted of glacial till soil classified as low plastic clay. The bridge column-drilled shaft systems were subjected to cyclic lateral load with the maximum lateral column top displacements reaching approximately ±30 cm (±11.8 in.). The soil at the test site was characterized at different temperatures using unconfined compression tests in the laboratory as well as in-situ Cone Penetration and Pressuremeter Tests. Using these test results, the lateral load behavior of the column-drilled shaft systems were analyzed utilizing numerical models that consisted of beam elements representing the concrete column and the shaft and lateral springs representing nonlinear p-y response of soil. This paper focuses on comparing the calculated responses of test units with different p-y curves that were developed for the soil near the ground surface using the laboratory and in-situ tests. From the experimental study, the response of the unit tested at -10°C (14°F) was found to show 44% increase in lateral force resistance and 0.84 m (2.76 ft) upward shift of the maximum moment location compared to the response of the identical unit tested at 23°C (73.4°F). Theoretical behavior that included the temperature effects on soil, concrete and steel properties provided good correlation with the measured responses when the soil near the ground surface was modeled using the unconfined compression test or the Cone Penetration Test data, but not the Pressuremeter test data.

Jan 1, 2006

By Arash Khosravifar, Matt Steffan

An expansion of the City of Klamath Falls Wastewater Treatment plant required geotechnical seismic hazard evaluations and deep foundation design. The site is located on the shore of Lake Ewauna and is underlain by diatom rich lake deposits. Diatomaceous soils exhibit unique engineering properties that are not well understood. Cyclic Direct Simple Shear (CDSS) testing was performed on three undisturbed samples to evaluate cyclic and post-cyclic properties of the diatomaceous soils. Results from the CDSS testing indicated that the soils would not liquefy in the classical sense, though cyclic softening behavior was observed. The CDSS results were used to develop a Cyclic Resistance Ratio curve for the diatomaceous soil to compare with clean sand liquefaction curves. Seismic lateral pile capacities were developed using two approaches. One approach used conventional p-multipliers for liquefied soil and modified them to reflect expected excess pore pressure ratios. The other approach applied residual strength and fifty percent strain values from post-cyclic monotonic shear testing. A lateral spread hazard zone was identified along the Lake shoreline and reduced, seismic lateral pile capacities were recommended. The objective of this paper is to report the seismic design considerations for this project in a unique geologic and seismic setting. INTRODUCTION The engineering properties of diatomaceous soils have rarely been studied and the cyclic behavior under seismic loading is generally unknown. Some of the critical geotechnical uncertainties of diatomaceous behavior include potential for large consolidation settlement, influence of irrecoverable strains due to diatom particle crushing, shear strength (peak and residual), and cyclic properties. This paper presents results of cyclic shear testing, seismic evaluations and seismic lateral pile design in diatomaceous soils performed for the expansion of a waste water treatment plant in the city of Klamath Falls, Oregon, site of the largest recorded earthquake in Oregon’s history. The expansion consisted of adding six new facilities at the existing Plant including influent pump station (IPS) and headworks, aeration basin, tertiary treatment, and other buildings. The IPS/headworks and aeration basin will be founded approximately 15 feet below ground. The other buildings will be founded at grade. The existing facilities are supported by timber piles that penetrate the surficial diatomaceous soils and terminate on a hard underlying deposit. Figure 1 shows the site plan and proposed additions.

Jan 1, 2018

By Shuvranshu K. Rout, Anup K. Mandal, Biswajit Das, Manos De

"To adopt new technology advancement in Steel Plant, there is a requirement of shifting of operation process from Coke Wet Quenching (CWQ) to Coke Dry Quenching (CDQ). New CDQ chamber foundation with deep basement and underground conveyor tunnel are to be constructed in an operating plant where heavy foundations and structures are located in close proximity. Furthermore, the existing CWQ system will be in operation during new underground construction and erection. Challenges to deep excavation of tunnel and chamber foundation consist of non-uniform ground condition, prevent washing out of soil from bottom of existing foundations, stability of existing nearby structures, presence of large number of underground utilities, ensuring safe underground workplace to construction resources engaged in new construction work along with project schedule and budget constraints. A combination methods involving use of soil nailing, soil grouting, contiguous bored pile and micro pile had been adopted for protection of excavation sides as well as existing structures. Each side of excavation in different stretches were analysed during design as well as construction stages. The use of combination of all techniques in a single brown field project in context of the nature of site constraints and safety issues made this a unique project.INTRODUCTIONSteel Industry is one of the backbones of industrial growth of any developing country like India. Due to increasing land prices most of the steel plants in India are expanding within their existing plant facilities. In addition to that, there is demand of adoption of new technology for future expansion projects to set new benchmarks with global standards.The property owner had earlier installed a Coke Wet Quenching (CWQ) for their Coke Plant. Now, there is a requirement from process department to proceed with Coke Dry Quenching (CDQ). To facilitate the CDQ within the existing CWQ which will be in operation is the main challenge for the property owner. The second challenge is the limited space for underground construction and subsequent equipment erection within the stipulated time frame.From a geotechnical prospective, the project team had uncertainty and reservations in their mind about the construction methodology. Therefore, the role of three “C”: ‘Consultant’-‘Client’- ‘Contractor’ and their combining brainstorming is essential to freeze a working plan for achieving the goal. In this paper, only the excavation support systems for underground foundation structures have been highlighted in the context of solving geotechnical problems."

Jan 1, 2017

By Darrell Wilder

When designing excavation support systems in urban environments, it is often necessary to consider the effect of vertical surcharge loads from adjacent structures. Several methods are used in practice to establish the horizontal surcharge-induce pressure on the excavation support. According to the experience of the authors, these methods often seem to overestimate the effect of the surcharge and may have significant impact on the construction costs. This paper explores several of these procedures and provides a discussion as to the reasons for the differences in surcharge effect predictions between different procedures. It also provides practical recommendations for designers dealing with excavation support design.

Jan 1, 2006

By Fathi Abdrabbo

Open caissons are used for many geotechnical engineering applications. Open caissons may be used as deep foundation elements bypassing weak soils to tip in firm deeper strata, and in rivers and maritime construction to reduce the risk of scour. Open caissons are also used for collecting sewage water through gravity sewer pipe networks or from sewer force mains. In such applications, the design and construction of open caissons require a detailed soil investigation program. In this way, the design and construction plan of an open caisson can be developed with full knowledge of the prevailing subsoil conditions. The engineering and construction techniques are key factors to achieve functional caissons. Based on close observations during construction stages, the current study presents some challenges that were encountered during the construction of two open caissons of internal diameters 20 m and 10 m (65.6 ft and 32.8 ft). This paper describes the procedure followed to alleviate the construction difficulties encountered. Site exploration program and control measures required to satisfy design and construction requirements are crucial aspects. Sinking of open caissons in dense or very dense sands is risky. Incorrect sinking of open caissons may cause extra cost, delay in construction, and harm to nearby structures. Air/water jetting near the cutting edge of an open caisson, outside slurry trench, and/or inside open trench may be used to drive an open caisson downward. Unsymmetrical work around an open caisson may lead to tilting of the caisson. If this occurs, the tilt should be immediately corrected before resuming the sinking process. Improper cleaning of fine materials on the caisson?s excavation bed, and/or inappropriate pouring of underwater concrete may result in a defective concrete seal. The paper contains a series of practical guidelines to assist those intending to use open caissons, and shares good caisson sinking practice with practitioners. Finally, the study aims to understand the difficulties encountered and to anticipate future problems.

Jan 1, 2012