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Thoughts on a Simple Means of Estimating Settlement in Thick Soil Layers in Accordance with Hypothesis B

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Advanced Research on Shallow Foundations (GeoMEast 2018)

Part of the book series: Sustainable Civil Infrastructures ((SUCI))

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Abstract

Settlement of structures founded on soft soil is a primary concern for geotechnical engineers. Buildings will frequently fail due to reaching the serviceability state due to cracking and or tilting from uneven settlement well before reaching the ultimate limit state. There is ongoing discussion in the geotechnical engineering community on the mechanics of settlement, specifically the point at which secondary consolidation (creep) begins: ought Hypothesis A or Hypothesis B be adopted? This paper addresses the challenges in estimating Hypothesis B, where the strain values in both thick and thin soil samples at the end of primary consolidation are believed to be a function of both the change in void ratio, which is understood well, and creep, which is not. A new empirical-based model, the EOP-Anchor model, is proposed to estimate Hypothesis B strain as a function of settlement time and soil thickness in conjunction with standard laboratory oedometer test data on thin samples.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. EPSRC FIBE CDT, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Casey J. Shepheard

  2. Mott MacDonald, Cambridge, UK

    Michael G. Williamson

Authors
  1. Casey J. Shepheard
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  2. Michael G. Williamson
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Correspondence to Casey J. Shepheard .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Soil-Structure Interaction Group in Egypt, Cairo, Egypt

    Hany Shehata

  2. California State University, Sacramento, CA, USA

    Braja Das

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Shepheard, C.J., Williamson, M.G. (2019). Thoughts on a Simple Means of Estimating Settlement in Thick Soil Layers in Accordance with Hypothesis B. In: Shehata, H., Das, B. (eds) Advanced Research on Shallow Foundations. GeoMEast 2018. Sustainable Civil Infrastructures. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-01923-5_5

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