Three-Dimensional Lower and Upper Bound Analyses of Pile Systems

Abstract The objective of this paper is to present simplified methods for determining the three-dimensional (3D) system capacities of pile foundations based on the lower and upper bound theorems of plasticity. The failure surface for a typical long offshore pile subjected to 3D head loads is derived...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:International journal of geomechanics 2020-12, Vol.20 (12)
Main Authors: Chen, Jinbo, Gilbert, Robert B, Murff, James D, Marshall, Peter W
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Failure analysis
Failure mechanisms
Failure surface
Limit analysis
Lower bounds
Methods
Offshore
Offshore drilling rigs
Offshore platforms
Pile foundations
Piles
Plastic properties
Plasticity
Technical Papers
Theorems
Upper bounds
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Summary:Abstract The objective of this paper is to present simplified methods for determining the three-dimensional (3D) system capacities of pile foundations based on the lower and upper bound theorems of plasticity. The failure surface for a typical long offshore pile subjected to 3D head loads is derived based on the lower bound (LB) theorem of plasticity, and the LB capacity of a pile system is then proposed. Using the failure mechanism determined from the elastic solution in the LB analysis of a pile system, the upper bound (UB) capacity of the pile system is obtained from the energy-balancing equation. An actual offshore platform is selected as a case study to demonstrate the proposed methods. The current methods extend the planar limit analysis by incorporating global torsion and out-of-plane failures and can be useful in designing and assessing pile systems.
ISSN:1532-3641
1943-5622
DOI:10.1061/(ASCE)GM.1943-5622.0001874