Code No: RR410102 Set No.

1
IV B.Tech I Semester Supplementary Examinations, February 2007
FOUNDATION ENGINEERING
(Civil Engineering)
Time: 3 hours Max Marks: 80
Answer any FIVE Questions
All Questions carry equal marks
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1. (a) Describe open excavation methods of exploration. What are their advantages
and disadvantages?
(b) What is a bore log? Give a typical example. [8+8]

2. (a) Discuss the various factors of safety used in the stability analysis of slopes.
Show that the factor of safety with respect to cohesion gives the same concept
as that of factor of safety with respect to height.
(b) Find the critical height of a slope of infinite extent having a slope of 300 .
The slope is made of stiff clay having cohesion of 20kN/m2 , angle of internal
friction of 200 , void ratio of 0.7 and specific gravity of 2.7. Consider the
following cases for the analysis. [8+8]
i. the soil is dry
ii. the water seeps parallel to the surface of slope
iii. the slope is submerged

3. (a) Compare Rankine’s and Coulomb’s theory of earth pressure.

(b) A 5m high rigid retaining wall has to retain a backfill of dry, cohesionless soil
having the following properties:-
φ= 300 , void ratio, e= 0.74, G= 2.68
Plot the distribution of Rankine lateral earth pressure on the wall and deter-
mine the magnitude and point of application of the resultant thrust. [8+8]

4. (a) Explain how you will determine active pressure by Culmann’s graphical method
for cohesionless soil without surcharge line load.
(b) What are the stability requirements of a retaining wall? [8+8]

5. (a) How is a deep foundation different from a shallow foundation? [4]

(b) Discuss five important factors affecting bearing capacity of sands. [6]
(c) Compute the safe bearing capacity of a continuous footing 2.0 m wide and
resting on a clayey sand at a depth of 1.5 m if c = 16 kN/m2 , φ = 250 , γsat =
19 kN/m3 , Nc = 25, Nq = 12.5, Nγ = 10 and F.S.=3.0. [6]

6. (a) The results of a plate load test on a sandy stratum are shown in Table. The
size of the plate used is 30 cm 30 cm. determine the size of a square footing for

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Code No: RR410102 Set No. 1
a column carrying a load of 1800 kN with a maximum permissible settlement
of 50mm. [6]

Load intensity (kN/m2 ) 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700
Settlement (mm) 0 4 5.5 9 12.5 19 28 63

(b) Discuss the tolerable settlements of various structures. [10]

7. (a) Discuss different methods for the installation of piles. [8]

(b) A timber pile is being driven with a drop hammer weighing 20kN and having
a free fall of 1m. The total penetration of the pile in the last five blows is
30mm. Determine the load carrying capacity of the pile using Engineering
News Record formula. [4]
(c) What are the different circumstances under which a pile foundation is used?
[4]

8. (a) Discuss about pile load tests.

(b) A group of 12 piles each having a diameter of 500mm and 30 metres long
supports a column. The piles are arranged in 3 rows and spaced at 1.25 metres
c/c. The properties of the foundation soil (clay) are as follows:-Unit weight
= 11 kN/m3 , Unconfined compressive strength = 100 kN/m2 .Determine the
capacity of the pile group. [8+8]

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Code No: RR410102 Set No. 2
IV B.Tech I Semester Supplementary Examinations, February 2007
FOUNDATION ENGINEERING
(Civil Engineering)
Time: 3 hours Max Marks: 80
Answer any FIVE Questions
All Questions carry equal marks
⋆⋆⋆⋆⋆

1. (a) Discuss with neat sketches any two boring methods used in soil exploration.
[10]
(b) What is a bore log? Give a typical example. [6]

2. (a) Define the various factors of safety used in the analysis of stability of slopes.
(b) An infinite slope in a sandy soil (with angle of friction of 400 ) has a slope of
300. What is the factor of safety? If there is seepage what will happen to the
above factors of safety? [8+8]

3. (a) What are the various types of earth pressures? Give field example for each
type.
[8]
(b) A 10m high retaining wall with smooth vertical back supports a horizontal
backfill (φ= 330 , c= 25kPa, Density above water table 15kN/m3 and below
water table 18kN/m3 ). The water table is at a depth of 3m below the surface
of the backfill. The backfill supports a surcharge of 10kPa. Determine the
magnitude and line of action of passive earth pressure. [8]

4. Describe Culmann’s graphical method of finding earth pressure and explain the
classical theory of earth pressure on which this procedure is based. Explain how
surcharge will affect earth pressure in active and passive states. [16]

5. (a) Explain what is meant by ‘safe bearing capacity’ of soil. Indicate how the
bearing capacity shallow footing in a given soil can be calculated from the
strength characteristics of the soil. [6]
(b) Distinguish clearly between ‘local shear failure’ and ‘general shear failure’ in
relation to design of foundations in sands. Where would you expect each of
them to occur? What corrections you would incorporate in Terzaghi’s bearing
capacity equation to workout bearing capacity when foundation does not fail
by general shear but fails by local shear? [10]

6. (a) Describe the procedure of determining the safe bearing capacity based on the
standard penetration test.
(b) A 1.8 m square column is founded at a depth of 1.8 m in sand, for which the
corrected N- value is 24. The water table is at a depth of 2.7 m. Determine
the net allowable bearing pressure for a permissible settlement of 40mm and
a factor of safety of 3 against shear failure. [8+8]

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Code No: RR410102 Set No. 2
7. (a) State the situations where pile foundations are preferred to over other types.
[4]
(b) State the advantages and disadvantages between cast-in-situ piles and pre-cast
pile.
[6]
(c) Using a drop hammer of 20 kN capacity and the height of drop being 4m. The
average penetration over the last 5 blows was 10mm. Determine the allowable
load on the pile using Engineering News formula. [6]

8. (a) Discuss about pile load tests.

(b) A group of 12 piles each having a diameter of 500mm and 30 metres long
supports a column. The piles are arranged in 3 rows and spaced at 1.25 metres
c/c. The properties of the foundation soil (clay) are as follows:-Unit weight
= 11 kN/m3 , Unconfined compressive strength = 100 kN/m2 .Determine the
capacity of the pile group. [8+8]

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Code No: RR410102 Set No. 3
IV B.Tech I Semester Supplementary Examinations, February 2007
FOUNDATION ENGINEERING
(Civil Engineering)
Time: 3 hours Max Marks: 80
Answer any FIVE Questions
All Questions carry equal marks
⋆⋆⋆⋆⋆

1. Describe, in brief, various geophysical methods. Discuss their limitations and uses.
[16]

2. (a) Discuss the method for checking the stability of an infinite slope in a cohesive
soil. What is critical height? [10]
(b) A vertical height is to be made in clayey soil for which test gave c= 35 kN/m2 ,
density= 16 kN/m3 and φ=0. Find the maximum height for which the cut
may be temporarily unsupported. Stability number is equal to 0.261. [6]

3. (a) What is meant by critical depth for vertical cut in clays? How is it altered?
[6 ]
(b) A retaining wall 10.0m high with a smooth vertical back retains horizontal
backfill. The properties of backfill are c=10kPa, φ= 300 , γ= 16kN/m3 , γsat =
20kN/m3 . The backfill carries a surcharge of 25kN/m2 . The water table is at
a depth of 3.0m below the surface of backfill. Sketch the active earth pressure
distribution on the back of the wall and determine the magnitude and line of
action of resultant active earth pressure. [10]

4. A masonry retaining wall has overall height of 2.4 m, width at top = 0.4 m. If
the earth face is vertical, determine minimum width of the wall for the following
data: Unit weight of earth retained = 16 kN/m3 ; Angle of shearing resistance,
φ=300. Coefficient of friction between the masonry and ground = 0.7.Unit weight
of masonry = 22 kN/m3 ; Maximum allowable base pressure = 120 kN/m2 .The top
surface of the backfill is level. Assume no cohesion between particles of backfill.
[16]

5. (a) Differentiate between [6]

i. Shallow foundation and deep foundation,
ii. Gross and net bearing capacity,
iii. Safe bearing capacity and soil pressure.
(b) Explain clearly ‘General shear failure’ and ‘Local shear failure’ and indicate
the field situations under which each type of failure occurs. [10]

6. (a) What is meant by presumptive bearing capacity? Write the presumptive bear-
ing capacity values for different soils.
(b) The following data is obtained from a plate load test on 60 60 cm plate:

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Code No: RR410102 Set No. 3
Pressure (kPa) 0.0 240 480 720 960 1200 1440 1680
Settlement(mm) 0.0 2.0 5.0 7.5 12.0 16.0 23.0 28.0

Plot a log-log graph and estimate the ultimate bearing capacity of the soil. [8+8]

7. (a) Write brief critical note on Engineering News formula. [6]

(b) A reinforced cement concrete pile weighing 35 kN (including helmet and dolly)
is driven by a drop hammer weighing 35 kN with an effective fall of 1.0m. The
average penetration per blow is 15mm. The total temporary elastic compres-
sion of the pile, pile cap and soil may be taken as 18 mm. Coefficient of
restitution 0.36. What is allowable load on the pile with a factor of safety of
2? Use Hiley’s formula. [6]
(c) What are the limitations of Dynamic pile formulae? [4]

8. (a) In a pile group, what are the geometrical properties that are to be considered
in bringing out a proper spacing of piles to ensure or progressively from one
side to the other? Explain.
(b) A group of 16 piles (diameter= 500cm, length= 14m, centre to centre spacing
= 1m) arranged in a square pattern passes through a recent fill (thickness=
3m) overlying a soft clay deposit (thickness= 5m) which is considering under
the fill load and rests in a stiff clay. All the strata are saturated. The soil
properties of different strata are as follows.

Type of soil Unit weight (γ), kN/m3 Strength parameters Adhesion parameter(α)
Cu (kPa) φu
Fill 16 50 0 0.60
Soft clay 17 20 0 0.40
Stiff clay 21 70 0 0.45

Estimate the ultimate load capacity of the pile group. [8+8]

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Code No: RR410102 Set No. 4
IV B.Tech I Semester Supplementary Examinations, February 2007
FOUNDATION ENGINEERING
(Civil Engineering)
Time: 3 hours Max Marks: 80
Answer any FIVE Questions
All Questions carry equal marks
⋆⋆⋆⋆⋆

1. What are the phases in a complete subsurface exploration and explain them in
detail.
[16]
2. (a) How a slope is analyzed using Swedish circle method? Derive an expression
for the factor of safety.
(b) Calculate the factor of safety of the slice shown in figure 1 using the given
therein.
[8+8]

Figure 1:

3. (a) Compare Rankine’s and Coulomb’s theory of earth pressure.

(b) A 5m high rigid retaining wall has to retain a backfill of dry, cohesionless soil
having the following properties:-
φ= 300 , void ratio, e= 0.74, G= 2.68
Plot the distribution of Rankine lateral earth pressure on the wall and deter-
mine the magnitude and point of application of the resultant thrust. [8+8]
4. (a) Explain how you will determine active pressure by Culmann’s graphical method
for cohesionless soil without surcharge line load.
(b) What are the stability requirements of a retaining wall? [8+8]
5. (a) Differentiate between different shear failure of soils. How the ultimate bearing
of local shear is determined. [10]

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Code No: RR410102 Set No. 4
(b) A strip footing is required to carry a net load of 1200 kN at a depth of 1 m.
Taking a factor of safety of 3, determine the width of the footing. Take φ =
300 , γ = 20 kN/m3 , c = 20 kN/m2 . Use Terzaghi’s theory. Assume general
shear failure (Nc = 37, Nq = 22, Nγ ) [6]

6. (a) Explain why bearing capacity equations for clay usually employ the undrained
shear strength?
(b) A standard penetration test conducted at a 2 m depth and subsequent labo-
ratory tests revealed the soil at a location as medium dense sand with a blow
count of 29 blows and a moist unit weight of 18 kN/m3 . It is planned to design
a square footing on this sand to carry a load of 3500 kN. As per the design
requirement the footing has to be designed for settlement criterion and the
maximum total settlement should be limited to 25 mm. The water table is at
6 m from the ground surface. Find the size of the footing. [8+8]

7. (a) Explain the assumptions made in the development of Hiley’s dynamic pile
formula. Write down the formula and explain the symbols used. Discus the
validity of these formulae in general. [8+8]
(b) Write brief notes on
i. Timber piles
ii. Concrete piles and
iii. Steel piles.

8. (a) What are the various approaches available to estimate the load carrying ca-
pacity of a pile?
(b) Define group efficiency of piles. What is Feld’s rule? How the efficiency of pile
is reduced in different arrangements of piles as per Feld’s rule. [8+8]

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