The static and dynamic resistance of cohesive soils on axially loaded piles

Abstract

Static and dynamic tests were conducted at the time of driving on each of two instrumented piles driven into cohesive soils to embedded depths of 64 and 74 feet. The tests were repeated 11 days later in order to investigate the response of the reconsolidated soil. The purpose of this study was to investigate the time dependent force-displacement response of cohesive soils induced by dynamic pole loads and to compare dynamic response with static response. All past attempts to achieve such comparisons were based either upon an assumed dynamic soil model and/or a simulated applied dynamic force estimated from the weight and speed of the driving hammer. In order to eliminate such assumptions in this study, the induced dynamic force was measured at five strategic locations along each instrumented pile. An accelerometer was used to record the motion at the head of the pile. This motion, together with the induced forces, were utilized in a multidegree spring-mass, system to directly compute the displacements of the masses representing various pile segments. The result of this analysis showed that when the applied loads were maximum, each pile experienced what may be described as rigid body motion. Consequently, a rigid pile model was utilized in a single-degree of freedom system to compute the dynamic soil resistance. Since both the dynamic soil resistance and the pile motions were known, a rigorous, or closed form solution of the equation of motion leads to a direct computation of the static component of soil resistance. This static component was found to approximate the static ultimate bearing capacity when the pile had experienced significant relative motion with respect to the soil.