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Numerical simulation of caisson installation and dissipation in kaolin clay and calcareous silt

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Abstract

Caissons are widely used to support fixed platforms in shallow water or moor floating platforms in deep water. Although the installation and pullout behaviours of caissons have been explored extensively, few studies are on the dissipation of excess pore pressures induced by installation of the caisson. The pull-out capacity or bearing capacity of the caisson under undrained conditions is enhanced by dissipation of excess pore pressure, given the caisson is installed in normally consolidated cohesive soil. This paper reports numerical simulations of caisson installation and the subsequent dissipation. The analyses were carried out using a coupled effective stress-pore pressure large deformation finite element (LDFE) approach incorporating the modified Cam-Clay model. The robustness of the LDFE model was validated by comparing the penetration resistance with centrifuge testing data and the guidelines. Caissons in two fine grained soils, kaolin clay and calcareous silt, were explored. The geometry of the caisson was varied to encompass the typical sizes of caissons. The dissipation responses at four locations near the caisson tip were interpreted. A normalised dissipation time around caissons is proposed, by modifying the conventional expression for a cone.

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Abbreviations

A :

Caisson full base area

A tip :

Caisson tip area

A wall :

Sum of internal and external caisson wall area

c h :

Operative coefficient of consolidation

c v :

Coefficient of consolidation

D :

Caisson outer diameter

D c :

Cone diameter

e :

Void ratio

e N :

void ratio at p ′ = 1 kPa on virgin consolidation line

F :

Caisson penetration resistance

G :

Elastic shear modulus

g :

Gravitational acceleration

I r :

Rigidity index

K 0 :

Coefficient of lateral earth pressure at rest

k :

Soil permeability

L :

Caisson length

M :

Slope of critical state line in p ′ − q space

N c :

Bearing capacity factor of caisson tip

p ′ :

Mean effective stress

q :

Deviatoric stress

S t :

Soil sensitivity

s u :

Undrained shear strength

s u , tip :

local undrained shear strength at caisson tip level

\( \overline{s_{\mathrm{u}}} \) :

Average undrained shear strength over caisson tip penetration depth

T c :

Dimensionless dissipation time factor of caisson

T ∗ :

Dimensionless dissipation time factor of cone

t d :

Dissipation time

t :

Caisson wall thickness

U :

Normalised excess pore pressure

z :

Caisson tip penetration depth

α :

Interface friction factor or shear strength factor

β :

Weighting factor

γ ′ :

Effective unit weight of soil

γ w :

Unit weight of water

Δu :

Excess pore pressure

Δu max :

Idealised back-extrapolated maximum excess pore pressure

κ :

Slope of swelling line

λ :

Slope of virgin consolidation line

μ :

Friction coefficient between the soil and caisson wall

ν :

Poisson’s ratio

ρ ′ :

Submerged density of soil

σ′n :

Normal effective stress

σ′v :

Vertical effective stress

φ ′ :

Internal friction angle

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Acknowledgements

The work forms part of the activities of the Centre for Offshore Foundation Systems (COFS), currently supported as a node of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Geotechnical Science and Engineering and as a Centre of Excellence by the Lloyd’s Register Foundation. The first author is grateful for support from the Australian Postgraduate Award. The third author is an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) Fellow and is supported by the ARC Project DE140100903.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Offshore Foundation Systems (COFS), The University of Western Australia, Crawley, Australia

    Kai Xiang Koh & Muhammad Shazzad Hossain

  2. Shandong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Environment and Geological Engineering, Ocean University of China, 238 Songling Road, Qingdao, 266100, China

    Dong Wang

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  1. Kai Xiang Koh
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  3. Muhammad Shazzad Hossain
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Correspondence to Dong Wang.

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Koh, K.X., Wang, D. & Hossain, M.S. Numerical simulation of caisson installation and dissipation in kaolin clay and calcareous silt. Bull Eng Geol Environ 77, 953–962 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10064-017-1091-7

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