Pile design using eurocode 7

• Main Author: Wong, Kia Fu
• Other Authors: Teh Cee Ing
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2014
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Civil engineering::Geotechnical
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/61115
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Singapore is converting the national building code from British Standards to Eurocode. The conversion will start in 2013 and after two years of transition, on 1 April 2015, Eurocode will be fully in force and British Standards withdrawn. The new code which is very much open to interpretation and did not specify exact calculation steps would cause difficulties to the designer to pick up the necessary design skills. This final year project aims to study the different design procedures on pile foundation design for axial loading, in particular comparing the new ‘Model Pile’ procedure against the ‘Alternative’ procedure. ‘Model Pile’ procedure allows lowering the partial factors as confidence gained with increasing number of boreholes being investigated. ‘Alternative’ procedure is similar to the British Standards, to design using characteristic parameters but uses different partial factors for different parameters instead of one overall factor of safety. Parametric studies were conducted to investigate the pile resistance for specific pile geometries and pile lengths required for a specific loading using both ‘Model Pile’ procedure and ‘Alternative’ procedure. The parametric studies were carried out by varying the permanent-variable load ratio, soil properties variation, and pile length-to-diameter ratio. Case studies of pile load tests from the literature were also discussed in this report to verify the calculated design pile resistance against the tested pile resistance. It is found that from the parametric studies and the literature cases studied, the Eurocode procedures generally perform better than the British Standards. Eurocode allows a higher design resistance for a specific pile geometry and shorter pile length for a specific loading. However, the ‘Model Pile’ procedure and ‘Alternative’ procedure are comparable depending on the model partial factor used. When using model factor of 1.2, the ‘Alternative’ procedure approaches the performance of ‘Model Pile’ procedure using nine boreholes; whereas when using model factor of 1.4, the ‘Alternative’ procedure approaches the performance of ‘Model Pile’ procedure using only one borehole.