BEHAVIOUR OF LATERALLY LOADED PILES UNDER CONSTANT VERTICAL LOAD

Abstract

The use of piles is man's oldest method of handling weak subsoils for foundations. Inspite of research on piles for such a long time, efforts are still onto improve methods for analysis, design and, construction of piles/pile groups. In recent years more sophisticated theoretical research is going on into the interaction between a pile or piles and the embedding soil because of the wide application of the piles in case of bridges, heavy industrial, hydraulic and water front structures. Piles used for water front structures are generally subjected to both lateral and vertical loads. So an attempt has been done to predict the Behaviour of Laterally loaded piles under constant vertical load. The present investigation consists of model experimental study of aluminium piles [L/d = 20, diameter, d = 15 mm] driven into homogeneous loose sand (Dr = 27.5%) and layered sand (Dr — 27'5%) for combined vertical and 77.5 70- lateral loads on single pile, four and nine pile groups. For four and nine pile groups spacing was also varying as 2d, 4d, 6d and 8d. It can be concluded from the results that in case of pile groups under lateral load individual pile failure was dominating in both homogeneous loose sand, and layered sand. It was also observed that lateral group efficiency of pile groups decreases with increase in vertical load.