International Journal of Earth Sciences and Engineering
ISSN 0974-5904, Volume 04, No 06 SPL, October 2011, pp. 780-784 #020410417 Copyright 2011 CAFET-INNOVA TECHNICAL SOCIETY. All rights reserved Large Diameter Pile Foundations for Cost Effective & Fast Track Construction
Kishore Kumar M Executive Engineer (Civil), Border Roads Organisation, Government of India, HQ CE (P) Vartak, c/o 99 APO. (Research Scholar at KL University) makam64@sify.com Hanumantha Rao Ch
Prof & Head, Dept of Civil Engineering, KL University, Green Fields, Vaddeswaram, Andhra Pradesh, Pin 522 502 (India). hrao_ce@kluniversity.in; hanumantharao.chappidi@gmail.com
ABSTRACT: Well foundations have stood with the time against vagaries of nature such as floods in the mountainous terrain resulting in heavy erosion and colossal damages due to shooting boulders/large sized debris. Caissons are relatively easy to construct provided sinking operations are smooth without requiring extensive tilt & shift rectifications especially at advanced stage of sinking. Constructional difficulties viz., prolonged sinking period extending to numerous working seasons, complicated & time consuming tilt & shift rectifications, complex and costly pneumatic sinking if warranted by site conditions force the designers to think seriously for an alternative solution. A case study is presented in this paper exploring the feasibility of large diameter pile foundations which is proved to be cost effective with an added advantage of fast track construction.
KEY WORDS: well foundation, pile, sinking, boulder.
INTRODUCTION Well foundation is a massive substructure required to extend deep inside the river bed in order to attract necessary net soil resistance against overturning, heavy scour, rolling boulders & floating debris. When sub-strata contains large boulders hindering penetration of piles, well foundation is the only solution. Caisson or well foundations are advisable in rivers where a heavy scour at flood time would otherwise bare the piles and lead to buckling. (4) The stability of well is derived mainly from the passive resistance mobilised from the soil grip below the maximum scour level and also from the huge end bearing resistance. If site conditions warrant pneumatic sinking, this specialised technique would squeeze the bridge project financially. Some of the major problems normally encountered in sinking of wells are construction of temporary islands for casting well curbs, clayey strata, sand blow and artesian conditions, counteracting tilts & shifts and obstacles during well-sinking, horizontal & vertical cracks in well steining, skin friction in caissons and pneumatic sinking.
LARGE DIAMETER PILE FOUNDATIONS Cast-in-place concrete piles are of two types viz., Shell Pile, in which a steel shell is first driven with a mandrel and concrete is placed, leaving the shell in place, and Shell-less Pile, in which the pipe and mandrel used for making the hole are removed as the concrete is filled in. The shell type is suitable for long piles, e.g. the Raymond cast-in-situ closed end pipe pile 114 m long under one of the monorail piers at Walt Disney World, Florida. (6) The shell-less type can be used only in firm soil or in conjunction with bentonite slurry. Most of the methods used for cast-in-place piles are either covered by patents or specialised by particular firms. These Large Diameter Pile Foundations are also known as Drilled Shaft Foundations and often controversy has arisen as to whether this is another type of pile or an alternate for pile foundations. Strictly speaking these large sized bored/drilled piles having a minimum diameter of up to 1.2 m for river bridges (1 m in the case of bridges located on land such as flyovers, road bridge over railway track etc) are almost analogous to well foundations. The only difference lies in the mode of dredging i.e., in the case of well foundations it is gradual as the steining comes up whereas in these large diameter piles the entire bore is drilled in one go. To prevent the collapse of sides of bore hole either steel casing pipe is used or bentonite slurry is employed. After the drilling operations are over, steel reinforcement cage is inserted before concreting of these piles whereas well is plugged with concrete. To sum up, these large sized piles combine the casting methodology of bored in-situ piles and load transfer mechanism of well foundation on account of their grip length and end bearing. In these bored piles, frictional forces are mostly neglected while calculating their load carrying capacity thus deriving their load carrying capacity from the transfer of load to the hard stratum on which the pile may be ultimately resting. Further in these large diameter pile or drilled shaft foundations, less emphasis is laid on group factor for arriving at load carrying capacity and more concern is shown towards construction problems as methodology viz., rotary drilling, use of drilled shafts in intermediate geo-materials such as soft rocks, hard pan and glacial till, tackling segregation of concrete, nondestructive evaluation techniques etc.
Fig 1. Rotary Drilling Machine 781 Large Diameter Pile Foundations for Cost Effective & Fast Track Construction International Journal of Earth Sciences and Engineering ISSN 0974-5904, Volume 04, No 06 SPL, October 2011, pp. 780-784 The availability of sophisticated bore drilling machines (Fig 1) capable of piercing through even rocks has now made it possible to go in for large diameter pile foundations. As compared to well foundations, each bored pile can be constructed in just 3 days. This aspect of faster construction with consequent overall cost economies can tilt the balance in favour of pile foundations vis--vis well foundation which may be better appreciated from the case study as discussed in the subsequent paragraphs. These bored piles are normally installed vertically, but it is still possible to absorb horizontal loads in this position though this gives rise to bending in the piles. (3) Methods of assessing the horizontal-load capacity of large diameter piles have been developed and these utilize sub-grade resistance in combination with stiffness of the pile. The techniques for constructing large-diameter bored piles are best suited to cohesive soils. Granular layers near to the surface can be successfully dealt with, but at greater depths the risks of the shaft-sides collapsing, become greater. The relative merits & limitations are as under :
Advantages Very large depths can be achieved with larger diameters and accordingly higher load carrying capacity can be easily achieved. Consequently the number of piles can be reduced under each foundation, which may further reduce construction time considerably. No disturbance to the surrounding mass of soil as in the case of open foundations and hence no reduction in soil resistance. Specially suited for harder strata such as stiff clay. Easy for keying into rock with an ultimate aim of ensuring efficient load transfer to the strata underneath. Cost economies and faster construction can be stated to be the two main advantages associated with these large sized bored piles irrespective of the type of strata.
Disadvantages and Difficulties Heavy initial financial outlay required due to larger equipment cost thus ultimately may work out to be costlier than well foundation. Precise constructional control on concreting operations, concrete mix, etc is difficult to be achieved at site. Maintenance of correct specific gravity of bentonite slurry at about 1.1 to 1.2 is needed, otherwise sides may collapse and cave in. In the case of loose soils steel liner (casing pipe) are required thus adding to the overall cost of foundations. Reduced skin-friction since the pile is not driven into the soil as in the case of precast piles, thus decreased load carrying capability.
TIDDING BRIDGE : A CASE STUDY Perturbed by the turbulent history of Tidding river causing destruction to temporary bailey suspension bridges with 360 feet span configuration year after year disrupting the only communication to strategic areas of Arunachal Pradesh bordering China, the necessity for construction of a permanent bridge was felt way back in the year 2000. Accordingly 155 m long prestressed concrete bridge with end spans of 45 m each on either side and central span of 65 m over 12 m diameter well foundation is under construction since 2002 over this furious river at km 67.95 on Tezu Hayuliang road in Arunachal Pradesh.
Hydraulic Design Design discharge Q = 2424 cumecs and Linear waterway W = 4.8 Q = 4.8 2424 = 236.32 m. Since the flowing river is confined to a channel of 95 m, it was decided to construct a bridge of length 155 m which seems to be adequate at site. However the value of effective linear waterway is adopted as 130 m while calculating scour depth to account for obstructions as piers etc.
Scour depth & Foundation level The silt factor assessed in sub soil investigation (SSI) report was ranging from 2.5 to 2.85 vide clause 703.2.2 of IRC : 78 2000 Standard Specifications & Code of Practice for Road Bridges Sec VII : Foundations & Substructure. As the river bed at Tidding is bouldery in nature with size of boulders varying between 200 mm to 3 m, the silt factor of 2.5 if adopted would be unrealistic and may result in huge scour depth requiring deeper foundations. Hence to arrive at a tentative founding level a silt factor of 10 may be adopted. Mean scour depth dsm in m = 1.34(Db 2 /Ksf) 1/3 (1) Where Db = Design discharge per metre width at effective linear water way = (Q + 30% Q) / L = (2424 + 30% of 2424) / 130 = 24.24 cumecs/m Silt factor of bed material obtained up to the level of anticipated deepest scour Ksf = 1.76 dm (2) Where dm = weighed mean dia of bed material in mm Mean scour depth dsm = 1.34{(24.24) 2 /10} 1/3 = 5.13 m Max scour depth near pier = 2 dsm = 10.26 m Max scour depth near abutments = 1.27 dsm = 10.26 m Founding level of pier well = HFL (Scour depth + grip length) = 308.10 (10.26 + 10.26/3) = 294.42 m. Founding level of abutment well = HFL (Scour depth + grip length) = 308.10 (6.52 + 6.52/3) = 299.40 m
Founding level of pier well has been fixed at RL 290 m would be over safe due to max scour value of 10.26 m is much higher side vis--vis observed scour of 3 m at existing temp bailey bridge, hence safe. Further, the pier of existing temp bridge though situated on open foundation in the mid stream withstood the fury of flood without abnormal scouring, thus proposed well foundation was considered to be safe from scouring criteria considering silt factor as 10.
The proposed pile foundation is extended up to RL 285 i.e. 5 m below well foundation thus sufficient grip ensured against buckling of these slender piles. Moreover concrete plugging between the piles in the 782 Kishore Kumar M, Hanumantha Rao Ch International Journal of Earth Sciences and Engineering ISSN 0974-5904, Volume 04, No 06 SPL, October 2011, pp. 780-784 portion which is projecting over the river bed level similar to well foundation would protect the substructure along with piles from damages by the rolling boulders and floating debris.
Sub Soil Investigation (SSI) Field investigation comprised core drilling in 4 locations up to a max depth of 41.5 m (Table 1). Disturbed samples were collected at each 1.5 m and standard penetration tests (SPT) were conducted using split spoon sampler during boring.
Fig 2. SSI pictograph at bridge site
Table 1. Bore Hole Data Bore Hole No 1 2 3 4 Existence of Rock (depth in m from GL) 0.0 3.0 14.5 4.0
In addition to these, change of soil strata, ground water level (GWL), colour, nature, stiffness etc were observed during field investigations. Undisturbed soil samples could not be collected as the soil samples were cohesionless in nature (c = 0). In SPT test, number of blows required to drive the samples for first 15 cm is neglected and the blows for the next 30 cm is considered and expressed in terms of N-value, which is found to be more than 50. Ground Water Level varied from 0 to 17 m below the existing ground level. Diameter of casing pipe used for boring was kept between 75 to 150 mm. It took about 1 to 3 hours for each 30 cm boring. As per clause 706.3.1.1.2 of IRC:78-2000 Code of Practice for Road Bridges, the allowable bearing pressure on rock may be decided upon not only on the strength of parent rock but also on overall characteristics particularly deficiencies like joints, bedding planes, faults, weathered zones etc. In the absence of such details or analysis of overall characteristics, value of factor of safety based on unconfined compressive strength of parent rock may be taken as 6 to 8. The proposed foundation being in rock layer in all the bore holes as shown in Table 1 & Fig 2, the safe bearing capacity SBC (considering factor of safety as 8) was calculated as 1/8 of minimum crushing strength i.e. 1/8 x 995.70 Kg/cm 2 =124 Kg/cm 2 (or) 1240 tonnes/m 2 (or) 12.4 MPa. But as per IRC : 78-2000, SBC is restricted to 3 MPa or 300 t/m 2 . The conservative design of well foundation can be gauged from the adopted value of SBC as low as 0.5 MPa.
Design of Pile Foundation In addition to the ability of soil or rock to carry the transferred load from a pile, the load capacity of the pile is important. The load capacity of the pile is governed by its structural strength and, to a lesser extent, by the surrounding environmental conditions. The structural strength is a function of the allowable stress levels that apply to the particular pile material and the cross- sectional area of the pile. To provide a factor of safety against failure, allowable stress levels normally are specified as a percentage of the peak strength value of the pile material as steel, concrete etc. Practically the structural strength of the pile (M 35 in the instant case i.e., 35 MPa allowable stress) is far higher than the allowable safe bearing resistance based on the settlement criteria viz., 3 MPa, thus limited by the underlying strata. In the absence of reliable analytical technique predicting the load carrying capacity of the piles based on load transfer between pile & surrounding soil (soil-structure interaction) and group behaviour with respect to individual piles, static load testing to failure is probably the best method available to determine the actual static capacity of a pile. However these static tests are expensive & time consuming and as a result not routinely conducted. In many cases a load test to twice the design load is conducted to verify safety factors and save money on the cost to extend the loads to failure range. These tests would further give some measure of assurance to the project design team but do little to advance the knowledge of design of pile in a particular soil. The simple act of striking a pile with a heavy hammer can also be thought of as an instantaneous load test to failure because in order for the pile to penetrate further into the soil, the soil must fail under the driving forces. In other words, pile driving is actually a very fast load test under each hammer blow.
Fig 3. Proposed pile foundation for bridge
Fig 3A. Grouping of piles at abutment & pier locations ROCK LAYER SAND MIXED WITH BOULDERS 783 Large Diameter Pile Foundations for Cost Effective & Fast Track Construction International Journal of Earth Sciences and Engineering ISSN 0974-5904, Volume 04, No 06 SPL, October 2011, pp. 780-784 With the right type of instrumentation, the engineer can take advantage of these failure measurements and use the information to predict potential static capacity in the field during pile driving operations itself. As per IRC: 78 2000, safe load carrying capacity of piles shall be lesser of the two values i.e., Ultimate load carrying capacity Ru = Rb + Rf (3) Structural Strength of Pile Neglecting skin friction Rf & considering end bearing resistance only Ru = Rb i.e., Ab x Fbu = (/4 x 1.5 2 ) x 300 t/m 2 = 529.87, Say 530 tonnes.
Adopting Factor of safety as 2.5, Safe load carrying capacity of each Pile = 530 / 2.5 = 212 tonnes Dead Load of Box girder taking average depth as 3.5 m for 155 m long bridge = 3138.75 tonnes. Dead Load of 4 Piers i/c Pier Cap = 1000.00 tonnes Live Load (Class 70 R) = 100.00 tonnes Total Load (in tonnes) = 4238, Say 4250 Nos of piles required considering safe load carrying capacity of each pile as 212 tonnes & taking Group Factor as 1.0 since spacing between piles exceeds 2.5 times diameter of pile = 4238 / 212 = 19.99. Conservative Design since frictional resistance totally ignored. Complying with the design parameters, total 20 Nos piles may be provided with 4 Nos each at end abutment locations & 6 Nos each at pier locations (Fig 3 & 3A).
Present Arrangement of Foundations The foundation comprises of 12 m diameter wells with well steining thickness as 2 m for abutments as well as piers and scope of work along with problems encountered are given at Table 2.
Table 2. Status of well foundation Well Foundation at Founding level (RL in m) Sinking Depth (in m) Problems encountered during construction Abutment A1 297.500 16.300 Buried under slide many times requiring massive clearance work. Pier P1 290.000 13.240 Sunken portion of well got silted very badly during floods hampering sinking operations. Pier P2 290.000 13.240 Tilt of 1 in 4 observed and rectification work under progress. Abutment A2 290.000 18.000
Cost Benefit Analysis The advancements in construction technology can permit any type of project feasible on ground but their economic viability should be ensured before its implementation i.e., the alternative selected should prove to be better than the traditional or conventional technique. Cost benefit analysis of proposed pile foundations in the place of well foundations has been carried out at Table 4 to 6 so as to test for its efficacy.
Economic Analysis
Fig 4. Shift at Pier Well P2
Table 3. Tilt & Shift at Pier Well P2
Tilt along bridge axis 1 in 4.61 Tilt along river axis 1 in 120 Permissible Tilt 1 in 80 Pier well P2 Shift towards d/s side 1.85 m Shift towards u/s side 2.628 m Permissible Shift 0.150 m
Table 4. Costing of Well Foundation Description A/U Qty Rate (Rs) Amount (Rs) Cutting edge Nos 01 1120000 1120000 Qty of muck to be removed for sinking Cum 4362.9 107.11 467310 Cost of dewatering a) 22 HP pump b) 50 HP pump
Cum Cum
1444 736
22 x 15 50 x 15
476520 552000 Concrete Plugging Cum 358.07 2930.35 1049270 Cost of well curb Cum 138.15 2930.35 404828 Cost of well steining Cum 502.66 2930.35 1472958 Cost of steel reinforceme nt MT 7.62 33040 251764 Laying of reinforceme nt i/c cutting, bending etc. Qtl (100 Kg) 76.2 741.05 56408 Total 5851118 Misc towards cost of well tilt & shift rectification LS 148882 G/Total 6000000 4 wells @ Rs. 60 lacs/well = Rs. 240 lacs Shifted Position 784 Kishore Kumar M, Hanumantha Rao Ch International Journal of Earth Sciences and Engineering ISSN 0974-5904, Volume 04, No 06 SPL, October 2011, pp. 780-784
Table 5. Costing of Pile Foundation (4 nos 1.5 m diameter bored cast in situ concrete piles at each abutment location and similar sized piles 6 nos under each pier (Total 20 in number) assuming a driven length of 20 m (against 15 m well sinking))
Description A/U Qty Rate (Rs) Amount (Rs) Mobilisation & demobilization of drilling eqpt LS 4000000 Providing MS Casing (Liner) from top of drilling platform upto founding level @ 0.25 MT/m 20 nos x 20 m = 400 m. Add extra50 m, thus 450 m @ 0.25 MT/m = 112.5 MT 112.50 42500 4781250 Underwater cutting of steel casing pipe Nos 20 25000 500000 Cutting/Boring through strata for 1.5 m dia pile including all plants etc Rotary Drilling m 400 42000 16800000 Concreting M35 for piles incl cost of materials cum 706.50 2930.3 2070292 Cost of steel reinforcement MT 64.59 33040 2134054 Laying reinforcement incl bending, cutting, welding etc. qtl 645.90 741.05 478644 Total 30764240
Table 6. Comparision of well & pile foundations Item of work Well Foundation Pile Foundation Foundation^ Rs. 240 lacs Rs. 307 lacs Substr & superstructure Rs. 538 lacs Rs. 538 lacs Escalation# Rs. 191 lacs Rs. 114 lacs Contingency Expdr* Rs. 200 lacs - Total Cost Rs. 1169 lacs Rs. 959 lacs % Saving 20% ^ Conservative estimate neglecting skin friction of piles & providing MS casing pipe. As such casing pipe is not required in this rocky strata & same if deleted, cost of pile foundation work will be at par with well foundation. Escalation catered for 5 years in well & 3 years for pile Extra expenditure towards launching and maintenance of temporary bailey suspension bridge for 2 consecutive years till commissioning of permanent PSC bridge considered since construction of bridge with well foundation taking total 5 years as completion period vis-a vis 3 years in the case of pile foundation.
CONCLUSION As far as the choice for deep foundation goes, well foundation & piles are the two viable options. Though well foundation has been a time tested structure, it is plagued by numerous problems as prolonged construction period, tedious sinking operations requiring rectifications to tilt/shift etc. Universally pile foundations have been widely adopted on all important bridges due to rapidity with which piles can be installed requiring just 2 to 3 days per pile. On the other hand minimum 2 to 3 months are required to sink a well provided there are no hurdles as tilt/shift, sand blow etc. The only doubt persists on whether these slender piles can withstand the havoc of flash floods with huge floating debris and rolling/shooting boulders in this heavy scouring river. This problem can be tackled as discussed in the case study by concrete plugging between the piles so as to give the solidity of well foundation and stone boulders/concrete block jacketing around the pile cap & beneath it so as to protect the structure from any anticipated damages during peak floods. The construction of large diameter cylindrical pile foundations has now become easier with the advent of sophisticated & high powered rotary drilling machines. The constraints in sinking depth due to considerations of limiting air pressure that humans can accept, means that pneumatic caissons are only rarely to be used in future, hence piles are the natural choice for bridge foundations in future.
REFERENCES
[1] IRC : 78 (2000). Standard Specifications & Code of Practice for Road Bridges Sec VII : Foundations & Substructure [2] IS 14362 (1996). Pile boring equipment - General requirements [3] IS 2911 : Part 1 - Sec 2 (1979). Bored cast-in-situ piles [4] Johnson Victor D (2010). Essentials of Bridge Engineering, Oxford & IBH Publishing Co. Pvt Ltd., New Delhi. [5] Ministry of Road Transport & Highways (2000). Pocket Book for Bridge Engineers (First Revision). [6] Raina VK Dr (2002). Concrete Bridge Practice : Analysis, Design & Economics, Tata McGraw Hill, New Delhi.