Research on the bearing capacity characteristics of initial support for horseshoe-shaped tunnel prefabrication

In view of the limited theoretical research on the load model of initial support for horseshoe-shaped prefabrication,this study focuses on the Luochuan Tunnel on the Xi'an-Yan'an newly built railway as the research object to explore its load model,load characteristic curve,plastic zone,deformation,and critical thickness.Theoretical research and numerical analysis were conducted.The results indicate that under the same boundary conditions,the ultimate bearing capacity of the prefabricated assembly initial support is higher than that of the shotcrete initial support,resulting in larger ultimate deformation capacity of the prefabricated assembly initial support.Based on numerical calculations,the ultimate deformation and critical thickness of the prefabricated initial lining for single-and double-track railway tunnels are obtained when buried at depths of 200,500,and 900 m in rock masses of classes Ⅲ,Ⅳ,and Ⅴ.

Construction of improved rigid blocks failure mechanism for ultimate bearing capacity calculation based on slip-line field theory

Based on the slip-line field theory, a two-dimensional slip failure mechanism with mesh-like rigid block system was constructed to analyze the ultimate bearing capacity problems of rough foundation within the framework of the upper bound limit analysis theorem. In the velocity discontinuities in transition area, the velocity changes in radial and tangent directions are allowed. The objective functions of the stability problems of geotechnical structures are obtained by equating the work rate of external force to internal dissipation along the velocity discontinuities, and then the objective functions are transformed as an upper-bound mathematic optimization model. The upper bound solutions for the objective functions are obtained by use of the nonlinear sequential quadratic programming and interior point method. From the numerical results and comparative analysis, it can be seen that the method presented in this work gives better calculation results than existing upper bound methods and can be used to establish the more accurate plastic collapse load for the ultimate bearing capacity of rough foundation.

Influence of the Spudcan Angle on the Ultimate Bearing Capacity of Jack-up Platform

Jack-up platforms of the Ocean engineering structures always withstand the vertical gravity loads which are applied to the seabed by spudcan, so it is important to determine the bearing capacity and the penetration depth of the spudcan for its geometry. In fact, it is up to the deformation law and the failure modes of soil surrounding the spudcan which can calculate the ultimate bearing capacity of the spudcan foundation on the soil seabed. By using the finite element analysis software Abaqus, the deformation law of soil around the spudcan is analyzed in detail, and the failure modes of soil surrounding the spudcan foundation are achieved. At the same time, based on the limit equilibrium theory, by use of static permissible slip-line field, the ultimate bearing capacity of the spudcan foundation is analyzed and the lower limit solution is derived theoretically, and the effect of the spudcan angle on the ultimate bearing capacity is investigated. The numerical results are compared with those obtained by the theoretical formulas deduced in this paper. On the basis of the lower limit solutions in this paper, the effect of the spudcan angle on the ultimate bearing capacity is revealed, and a practical bearing capacity formula is given to take the effect of the spudcan angle into consideration.

Analysis of the Ultimate Bearing Capacity of Oil Field Drilling Masts

In order to improve the safety of drilling operations, this paper presents a new method for forecasting the ultimate bearing capacity of oil field drilling masts. The method is based on a double nonlinear finite element theory and applies a referential stress method for measuring defects and defacements. The lab mast model was analyzed using the proposed method. The relative error, which was less than 5.0% between the forecast results and the destructive experiment values,verified the correctness of this method. It also forecasts the ultimate bearing capacity for a local drilling mast.

Ultimate Bearing Capacity of Subsoils to Marine Pipelines

Based on the theory of limit analysis, the Finite Difference Method (FDM) is established for evaluating the ultimate bearing capacity of subsoils to bear the unburied pipelines. The analytical results of bearing capacity of the ideal clay is given. The approach to bearing capacity evaluation of cohesionless subsoils without surcharge is suggested. The results from this method are consistent with those obtained from model tests.

Study of the Hole Wall Soil's Capacity by the Action of the Bearing Device of Rodless Drilling Rig

In order to ensure the bearing device of rodless drilling rig to press stably against the hole wall, it has to analyze the contact between the soil pore wall and the bearing device to study whether the soil pore will shear failure. This paper uses the method to calculate the additional stress of any point in soil mechanics to get the three-dimensional stress state of any point of the soil pore under the support plate, and use the numerical analysis method to calculate the shear stress and its relative intensity. Under the circumstances of maximum torque and maximum pressure, ABAQUS is used to make a finite element analysis of the capacity of the soil pore. The results of numerical analysis and FEA indicate that in the condition of the support plate will not deform; the contact area between the soil pore and the support plate is rectangular; in the force process, the soil under the ends of the support plate have the trend of yield, while it meets the condition of Mohr-Coulomb not to yield generally.

Methods for Estimating the Ultimate Bearing Capacity of Layered Foundations

The Meyerhof and Hanna′s(M-H) method to estimate the ultimate bearing capacity of layered foundations was improved. The experimental results of the load tests in Tianjin New Harbor were compared with predictions with the method recommended by the code for the foundations of harbor engineering, i.e. Hansen′s method and the improved M-H method. The results of the comparisons implied that the code and the improved M-H method could give a better prediction.

Development of mathematically motivated hybrid soft computing models for improved predictions of ultimate bearing capacity of shallow foundations

Ultimate bearing capacity(UBC)is a key subject in geotechnical/foundation engineering as it determines the limit of loads imposed on the foundation.The most reliable means of determining UBC is through experiment,but it is costly and time-consuming which has led to the development of various models based on the simplified assumptions.The outcomes of the models are usually validated with the experimental results,but a large gap usually exists between them.Therefore,a model that can give a close prediction of the experimental results is imperative.This study proposes a grasshopper optimization algorithm(GOA)and salp swarm algorithm(SSA)to optimize artificial neural networks(ANNs)using the existing UBC experimental database.The performances of the proposed models are evaluated using various statistical indices.The obtained results are compared with the existing models.The proposed models outperformed the existing models.The proposed hybrid GOA-ANN and SSA-ANN models are then transformed into mathematical forms that can be incorporated into geotechnical/foundation engineering design codes for accurate UBC measurements.

Correlation between the Bearing Capacity of Crude Oil Contaminated Soil of Mgbede and the Percentage Contamination

This study was conducted in Mgbede, River State, Nigeria, hosting up to, or even more than 100 oil wells. It examined the relationship between the bearing capacity of crude oil contaminated soil and the percentage contamination. Four uncontaminated soil samples were randomly collected at 1.5 m depth within the oil field with hand auger and analyzed for the load bearing properties limited to cohesion, angle of internal friction and bulk density. With these parameters, the bearing capacity was determined for each sample. Crude oil, collected from one of the oil wells with viscosity 0.02611 poises at 40~C and specific gravity 0.8227 g/cm3, was used as the contaminant. This was mixed with the soil sample at 5%, 10%, 15% and 20% concentrations. The mean values of the bearing capacity were 582.458 KN/m2, 495.35 KN/m2 for square and strip footings respectively at 0% contamination, 240.735 KN/m2 and 204.753 KN/m2 at 5%, 321.683 KN/m2 and 274.593 KN/m2 at 10%, 127.003 KN/m2 and 109.12 KN/m2 at 15%, 105.28 KN/m2 and 90.758 KN/m2 at 20% for square and strip footings, respectively. The results showed a consistent decrease in the load bearing values as the crude oil content increased. The result of the null hypothesis established a strong and significant relationship between the bearing capacity of crude oil contaminated soil and the percentage contamination.

California Bearing Ratio Test on the Bearing Capacity of a Foundation in Unsaturated Soil

The value of the California bearing ratio (CBR) test is an index making it possible to evaluate the load of the foundation soil and the resistance of the pavement materials. The California Bearing Ratio (CBR) of unsaturated soils is particularly related to their quality. The mechanism affecting the bearing capacity, in the case of California Bearing Ratio (CBR), has been studied as a transformation of red clay for the backfill. In this study, the effect of compaction energy on compaction characteristics and California Bearing Ratio (CBR) values was investigated. The relationship between the CBR value (California Ratio Ratio) and the degree of compaction is characterized by a gradual evolution of unsaturated soils with different water contents. The results show that the compaction degree and California Bearing Ratio (CBR) value of the soil in the cold region are insufficient, but the bearing capacity of the compacted soil after immersion under the maximum dry density can still meet the filling requirements. The red clays tested are considered useful as bedding in areas of unsaturated soils.

Influence of Incomplete Soil Plugs on Bearing Capacities of Bucket Foundations in Clay

Due to the uneven seabed and heaving of soil during pumping,incomplete soil plugs may occur during the installation of bucket foundations,and the impacts on the bearing capacities of bucket foundations need to be evaluated.In this paper,the contact ratio(the ratio of the top diameter of the soil plug to the diameter of the bucket)and the soil plug ratio(the ratio of the soil heave height to the skirt height)are defined to describe the shape and size of the incomplete soil plug.Then,finite element models are established to investigate the bearing capacities of bucket foundations with incomplete soil plugs and the influences of the contact ratios,and the soil plug ratios on the bearing capacities are analyzed.The results show that the vertical bearing capacity of bucket foundations in homogeneous soil continuously improves with the increase of the contact ratio.However,in normally consolidated soil,the vertical bearing capacity barely changes when the contact ratio is smaller than 0.75,while the bearing capacity suddenly increases when the contact ratio increases to 1 due to the change of failure mode.The contact ratio hardly affects the horizontal bearing capacity of bucket foundations.Moreover,the moment bearing capacity improves with the increase of the contact ratio for small aspect ratios,but hardly varies with increasing contact ratio for aspect ratios larger than 0.5.Consequently,the reduction coefficient method is proposed based on this analysis to calculate the bearing capacities of bucket foundations considering the influence of incomplete soil plugs.The comparison results show that the proposed reduction coefficient method can be used to evaluate the influences of incomplete soil plug on the bearing capacities of bucket foundations.

Variation analysis of ultimate pullout capacity of shallow horizontal strip anchor plate with 2-layer overlying soil based on nonlinear M-C failure criterion

Based on the nonlinear Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion and an associated flow rule,a kinematic admissible velocity field of failure mechanism of the 2-layer soil above a shallow horizontal strip anchor plate is constructed.The ultimate pull-out force and its corresponding failure mechanism through the upper bound limit analysis according to a variation principle are deduced.When the 2-layer overlying soil is degraded into single-layer soil,the model of ultimate pullout force could also be degraded into the model of single-layer soil.And the comparison between results of single-layer soil variation method and those calculated by rigid limit analysis method proves the correctness of our method.Based on that,the influence of changes of geotechnical parameters on ultimate pullout forces and failure mechanism of a shallow horizontal strip anchor with the 2-layer soil above are analyzed.The results show that the ultimate pull-out force and failure mechanism of a shallow horizontal strip anchor with the 2-layer soil above are affected by the nonlinear geotechnical parameters greatly.Thus,it is very important to obtain the accurate geotechnical parameters of 2-layer soil for the evaluation of the ultimate pullout capacity of the anchor plate.

Seismic stability of reinforced soil walls under bearing capacity failure by pseudo-dynamic method

In order to evaluate the seismic stability of reinforced soil walls against bearing capacity failure,the seismic safety factor of reinforced soil walls was determined by using pseudo-dynamic method,and calculated by considering different parameters,such as horizontal and vertical seismic acceleration coefficients,ratio of reinforcement length to wall height,back fill friction angle,foundation soil friction angle,soil reinforcement interface friction angle and surcharge.The parametric study shows that the seismic safety factor increases by 24-fold when the foundation soil friction angle varies from 25°to 45°,and increases by 2-fold when the soil reinforcement interface friction angle varies from 0 to 30°.That is to say,the bigger values the foundation soil and/or soil reinforcement interface friction angles have,the safer the reinforced soil walls become in the seismic design.The results were also compared with those obtained from pseudo-static method.It is found that there is a higher value of the safety factor by the present work.

Ultimate Lateral Capacity of Rigid Pile in c–φ Soil

To date no analytical solution of the pile ultimate lateral capacity for the general c–φ soil has been obtained. In the present study, a new dimensionless embedded ratio was proposed and the analytical solutions of ultimate lateral capacity and rotation center of rigid pile in c–φ soils were obtained. The results showed that both the dimensionless ultimate lateral capacity and dimensionless rotation center were the univariate functions of the embedded ratio. Also,the ultimate lateral capacity in the c–φ soil was the combination of the ultimate lateral capacity（f;） in the clay, and the ultimate lateral capacity（f;） in the sand. Therefore, the Broms chart for clay, solution for clay（φ=0） put forward by Poulos and Davis, solution for sand（c=0） obtained by Petrasovits and Awad, and Kondner’s ultimate bending moment were all proven to be the special cases of the general solution in the present study. A comparison of the field and laboratory tests in 93 cases showed that the average ratios of the theoretical values to the experimental value ranged from 0.85 to 1.15. Also, the theoretical values displayed a good agreement with the test values.

New design equations for estimation of ultimate bearing capacity of shallow foundations resting on rock masses

Rock masses are commonly used as the underlying layer of important structures such as bridges, dams and transportation constructions. The success of a foundation design for such structures mainly depends on the accuracy of estimating the bearing capacity of rock beneath them. Several traditional numerical approaches are proposed for the estimation of the bearing capacity of foundations resting on rock masses to avoid performing elaborate and expensive experimental studies. Despite this fact, there still exists a serious need to develop more robust predictive models. This paper proposes new nonlinear prediction models for the ultimate bearing capacity of shallow foundations resting on non-fractured rock masses using a novel evolutionary computational approach, called linear genetic programming. A comprehensive set of rock socket, centrifuge rock socket, plate load and large-scaled footing load test results is used to develop the models. In order to verify the validity of the models, the sensitivity analysis is conducted and discussed. The results indicate that the proposed models accurately characterize the bearing capacity of shallow foundations. The correlation coefficients between the experimental and predicted bearing capacity values are equal to 0.95 and 0.96 for the best LGP models. Moreover, the derived models reach a notably better prediction performance than the traditional equations.

Finite element analysis of effect of soil displacement on bearing capacity of single friction pile

Effect of soil displacement on friction single pile in the cases of tunneling,surcharge load and uniform soil movement was discussed in details with finite element method.Lateral displacement of the pile caused by soil displacement reached about 90% of the total displacement,which means that P-Δ effect of axial load can be neglected.The maximum moment of pile decreased from 159 kN·m to 133 kN·m in the case of surcharge load when the axial load increased from 0 to the ultimate load.When deformation of pile caused by soil displacement is large,axial load applied on pile-head plays the role of reducing the maximum bending moment in concrete pile to some extent.When pile is on one side of the tunnel,soil displacements around the pile are all alike,which means that the soil pressures around the pile do not decrease during tunneling.Therefore,Q-s curve of the pile affected by tunneling is very close to that of pile in static loading test.Bearing capacities of piles influenced by surcharge load and uniform soil movement are 2480 kN and 2630 kN,respectively,which are a little greater than that of the pile in static loading test(2400 kN).Soil pressures along pile increase due to surcharge load and uniform soil movement,and so do the shaft resistances along pile,as a result,when rebars in concrete piles are enough,bearing capacity of pile affected by soil displacement increases compared with that of pile in static loading test.

Study of the Bearing Capacity at the Variable Cross-Section of A Riser- Surface Casing Composite Pile

Reducing the cost of offshore platform construction is an urgent issue for marginal oilfield development.The offshore oil well structure includes a riser and a surface casing.The riser,surface casing and oil well cement can be considered special variable cross-section piles.Replacing or partially replacing the steel pipe pile foundation with a variable cross-section pile to provide the required bearing capacity for an offshore oil platform can reduce the cost of foundation construction and improve the economic efficiency of production.In this paper,the finite element analysis method is used to investigate the variable cross-section bearing mode of composite piles composed of a riser and a surface casing in saturated clay under a vertical load.The calculation formula of the bearing capacity at the variable section is derived based on the theory of spherical cavity expansion,the influencing factors of the bearing capacity coefficient N_(c) are revealed,and the calculation method of N_(c) is proposed.By comparing the calculation results with the results of the centrifuge test,the accuracy and applicability of the calculation method are verified.The results show that the riser composite pile has a rigid core in the soil under the variable cross-section,which increases the bearing capacity at the variable cross-section.

Limit analysis of ultimate uplift capacity and failure mechanism ofshallow plate anchors in multi-layered soils

Considering the fact that in some complex cases,plate anchors are buried in multi-layered geotechnical materials,the ultimate dynamic analysis was performed to investigate the uplift capacity and failure mechanism of shallow strips and circular plate anchors in multi-layered soils.The nonlinear strength criterion and non-associated flow rule of geotechnical materials were introduced to investigate the influence of nonuniformity on the pullout performance and failure mechanism of shallow plate anchors.The expressions of the detaching curves or surfaces were obtained to reflect the failure mechanism,which can be used to figure out the ultimate uplift capacity and failure range.The results are generally in agreement with the numerical simulations and previous research.The effects of various parameters on the ultimate uplift capacity and failure mechanism of plate anchors in multi-layered soils were investigated,and it is found that the ultimate uplift capacity and failure range of shallow anchors increase with the increase of initial cohesion and dilatancy coefficient,but decrease with the unit weight,axial tensile stress and nonlinear coefficient.

The primary influence of shear band evolution on the slope bearing capacity

Slope bearing capacity is one of the most important characteristics in slope engineering and is strongly influenced by weak planes,loading conditions,and slope geometry.By presenting the evolution of slip surfaces,this paper explored how the slope bearing capacity is affected by widely observed influencing factors.The initiation and propagation of slip surfaces are presented in laboratory model tests of slope using the transparent soil technique.Shear band evolution under various weak planes,loading conditions,and slope geometries were experimentally presented,and slope bearing capacities were analyzed with the process of shear band evolution.This paper verified that slip surface morphologies have a strong relation with the slope bearing capacity.The same slip surface morphology can have different evolutionary processes.In this case,it is the shear band evolution that determines the slope bearing capacity,not the morphology of the slip surface.The influencing factors such as pre-existing weak planes,loading conditions,and slope geometry strongly affect the slope bearing capacity as these factors govern the process of shear band evolution inside the slope.

Upper Bound Solution of the Resisting Moment Bearing Capacity of A Composite Bucket Shallow Foundation of An Offshore Wind Turbine in Sand

Bearing the large moment that is generated by the wind load that acts on the upper structure of offshore wind turbines is an important feature of their foundations that is different from other offshore structures.A composite bucket shallow foundation(CBSF)has been proposed by Tianjin University to address the soft geological conditions in the offshore regions of China for wind turbines.The CBSF is a new type of foundation and is effective against large moments.The soil deformation test of a CBSF and the numerical simulation study under the same working conditions are carried out to determine the failure mechanism of a CBSF under moment loading.The resisting soil compression rateηm is defined as a new empirical parameter that indicates the ability of the soil inside the bucket to resist moment loading.The upper limit of the resisting moment bearing capacity of the bucket foundation is derived through the upper bound theorem of classical plasticity theory based on the failure mechanism.The calculation method is validated by tests of bucket models with different height-diameter ratios in sand under moment loading.