Investigating the Reliability of Negative Skin Friction on Composite Piles

Abstract

In this study, the impact of Negative Skin Friction (NSF) on composite piles concerning different variables such as different pile sections, the amount of concrete and steel consumption, and various interaction coefficients of the pile-soil system in both solid and hollow conditions are evaluated using numerical methods. Besides, the effect of the variables considered on the negative skin friction and pile’s settlement is investigated. Numerical analyses were performed using ABAQUS and MATLAB. The results showed that the amount of frictional stress on the pile decreases if the hollow sections are used. However, the hallow pile experiences more settlements than other piles’ models. On the other hand, if the amount of consumed steel in a pile is reduced, the amount of negative skin friction induced in a pile decreases, while the pile settlement increases. After examining the Finite Element of concrete piles in fine-grained soils, the safety surface of the suggested numerical relationship was considered in the phenomenon of negative friction on the pile. For this purpose, considering the uncertainty parameters such as mean, variance and probability function for overcharge, soil parameters, dimensions and different types of the single pile, the amount of settlement, the stress created on the pile, the position of neutral plane on the pile and drag load were calculated using the proposed relationship. Finally, the safety surface of the proposed relationships or comparisons of a Finite Element results in a close approximation to the real models was computed.

Keywords

• drag load
• negative skin friction
• neutral plane
• reliability
• uncertainty