2018

Excavation analysis using Plaxis

2D. Case study: O6 station in
the Kaohsiung Rapid Transport
System (KRTS)

DEEP EXCAVATION
BAGAS ARYASETA (N66067216)

NATIONAL CHENG KUNG UNIVERSITY | TAIWAN

INTRODUCTION
A deep excavation means a man made cavity or depression activites in the earth’s surface (soil or rock)
at depths greater than 4.5 m. Deep excavations require careful consideration especially when
constructed in urban areas. Deep excavation can significally affect the existing building nearby.
Retaining wall and support system selection in deep excavations can have significant impact on time
cost and performance. To maintain the excavation problem in the field, analysis of deep excavation is
required usually before the start of the design process.

Plaxis 2D is a two-dimensional finite element program developed especially for deep excavation
problems. This program has a friendly user interface and has been widely used around the world. By
using this program, various deep excavation problems can be simulated well.

O6 station on the orange line in the Kaohsiung rapid transport system (KRTS) is located in the centre
of Kaohsiung city, near the junction of Ming-chu and Chung-Cheng roads. The length and width of the
excavation are 194 and 20.7 m, respectively. The construction was carried out using the bottom-up
method. The soil at the site mostly consists of silty fine sand.

PROBLEM’S BACKGROUND
The details about the excavation squence are given in the table 1 below. The diaphragm wall depth is
36 m. The struts have varied depth and width from 350 to 414 and 350 to 405, respectively. The details
of the diaphragm wall and struts properties can be seen in the table 2 below.
Table 1. Construction squence

Table 2. Diaphragm wall and strut properties

Based on borehole data, the soil at O6 consists of silty fine sand with occasional bands of silty clay.
The site has 11 soil layer with a depth of up to 60 m. The unit weight varies from 18.6 to 20.0 kN/m3.
The soil model used in the Plaxis is Hardening Soil. The details about the soil layer are given in the
table 3 below.
 Table 3. Soil properties

ANALYSIS STEP
Drawing the excavation model
First step is to create new project . In this step, model and dimensions of excavation site is defined.

Figure 1. Create new project window

Model of soil layer, struts and diaphragm wall of excavation site can be seen in the figure 2 below.
The total length and depth of excavation model is 230,7 m and 60 m, respectively.

36 m
60 m

20,7 m 210 m
Figure 2. Excavation model
Creating and assigning material properties
The next step is to create material properties of soil, diaphragm wall and strut. The material properties
is including soil unit weight, permeability, stiffness parameter, strength parameter, and of material.
After that, assign it into the excavation model.

Figure 3. Material properties window

Figure 4. Material Sets Windows

The result of excavation model after assigned by material properties can be seen in the figure 4
below.
 Figure 5. Excavation model after assigned by material properties

Generating mesh
The next step is to generate mesh. The purpose of this step is to divide the model into pieces. Each
piece represents an element. An element is the basic building block of finite element analysis. An
element is a mathematical relation that defines how the degrees of freedom of a node relate to the
next. The DOF of a node also relates what types of forces and restraints are transmitted through the
node to the element. The mesh coarseness used in this study is medium element distribution.

Figure 6. Mesh generation setup

Figure 7. Analyticcal mesh of excavation model

The shape of an element will influence the analytical accuracy of the element and the surrounding
elements. It is therefore necessary to place good elements in crucial areas. In less crucial areas some
elements not so good can be placed.

For example, if the retaining wall is an important object of analysis, good elements should be placed
in its sorroundings. On the other hand, the boundary areas are not important areas, some elements
not that good can be placed there.The density of mesh in excavation zone should be as fine as possible
and also the transition zone between the wall and the surrounding soils should be as fine as possiblle.
Plaxis 2D can also generate fine mesh in some important area by using Refine command.
Defining initial condition
Initial condition comprise the initial geometry configuration and the initial stress state. This step also
define the water weight and initial pore pressure. In this case, the water pressure generation is set
default (phreatic level). It means the pore water pressure is under atmospheric conditions (pressure
head is zero). Based on field condition, the actual groundwater level varied seasonally between 2 and
4 m below the surface. It was thus assumed to be 3 m below the surface for the purposes of the
analysis.

Figure 8. Water weight and water pressure generation

Figure 9. Assigned pore water pressure to the model

The next step is generation of initial stress. In this study, intial stress is generated by using K0
procedure. The K0 procedure is particularly suitable in cases with a horizontal surface and with all soil
layers and phreatic levels parallel to the surface.

Figure 10. K0 procedure

 Figure 11. Initial soil stresses

Calculations
In a calculation process, the squence of excavation process is defined. The squence of excavation
should be initial phase, wall and load, excavation stage 1, strut 2 installation, excavation stage 2, strut
2 installation and so on. The details can be seen in the figure 12 below.

Figure 12. Calculations window

RESULT AND DISCUSSION

Diaphragm wall deflection and ground settlement
The result of diaphragm wall deflection and ground settlement can be seen in the figure 13 and 16
respectively. Figure 13(a) and 13(b) shows wall deflection of 3.4 m and final excavation depth,
respectively. While for ground settlement shown in figure 16(a) and 16 (b). To make it easier to see
wall deflection and ground settlement, data has been converted into Excel graph. It can be seen in the
figure 14 and 17 for diaphragm wall deflection and ground settlement, respectively. To make a
comparison, excavation data result obtained from a reference paper also included (figure 15 and 18).
Figure 13. Wall deflection in Plaxis (negative value). (a) 3.4 m of excavation depth and (b) final excavation depth

a b
70 70

60 60

50 50

40 40

30 30

20 20

10 10

0 0
0 10 20 30 0 10 20

Figure 14. Wall deflection in Excel. (a) 3.4 m of excavation depth and (b) final excavation depth

Figure 15. Wall deflection based on reference. (a) 3.4 m of excavation depth and (b) final excavation depth
 Figure 16. Ground setlement in Plaxis. (a) 3.4 m of excavation depth and (b) final excavation depth

a b
0 0
0 50 100 150 200 250 0 50 100 150 200 250
-1 -10

-2 -20

-3 -30

Figure 17. Ground settlement in Excel. (a) 3.4 m of excavation depth and (b) final excavation depth

Figure 18. Ground settlement in based on reference. (a) 3.4 m of excavation depth and (b) final excavation depth

There are three excavation data in one graph from reference paper. The reference paper also made
predicted excavation data by using Plaxis software also. Figure 15 and 18 show predicted and observed
movement at the first stage of excavation (3.4 m) and at the end of excavation. The predicted
deflected shape of the wall using stiffness based on the shear wave velocities (the ‘‘Es” prediction)
and that based on the SPT-N values (the ‘‘E” prediction) both underestimate the horizontal
displacements at the initial stage of excavation. The ‘‘E” prediction is closer to the observed deflected
shape than the ‘‘Es” prediction for the final excavation stage. Wall deflection at 3.4 m of excavation
depth produced by this study (figure 14) seems the same compare to reference paper. Although, the
result by this study overestimate the wall deflection at the initial stage of excavation and little
underestimate the wall deflection at depth 20 m. For wall deflection at the end of excavation, the
result by this study underestimate the measured result. The result from this study is relatively close
compared the “Es” prediction rather than “E” prediction and measured result. But for the shape of
the graph itself, it seems the result from this study is very different compared to reference result. This
is most likely because the soil model used in this study is different from the reference paper. In this
study, the soil model is Hardening-Soil. While the model used by reference paper is Mohr-Coulomb
model.

In the case of surface settlements (figure 18), for the reference paper, the ‘‘Es” prediction is better
than the ‘‘E” prediction both for the initial stage and the final stage, although neither is very accurate.
The ‘‘E” prediction for longterm surface settlements is significantly greater than the observed values.
From reference paper (figure 18), It is noted that the observed rate of change of surface settlements
with distance from the wall is much greater than predicted. This may be related to the fact that the
elastic behaviour of the soil is nonlinear. The fact that this is less critical for horizontal displacements
could be due to the fact that the movement is dominated by the average stiffness of the elements
close to the wall. The ground settlement result from this study seems good for the distance less than
50 m from the wall (figure 17) compare with the reference paper result. But after 50 m, both 3.4 m
and final stage of excavation seem underestimate the result from paper.

RECOMMENDATION
In the excavation case of O6 station in Kaohsiung Rapid Transport System (KRTS), the soil model used
in this study (Hardening soil) seems not able to describe the wall deflection and ground settlement
graph correctly. Compared with the results of the reference paper, the soil model used is Mohr
Coulomb better suited to this excavation case.
References
Bin-Chen Benson, H. (2009). A Case Study on the Behaviour of a Deep Excavation in Sand. Computers
and Geotechnics, 665-675.

Magdi, M. E., & Ashraf, E.-A. (2016). Importance of Deep Excavation Support and Its Influence on
Adjacent Buildings. 7th Annual Conference for Postgraduate Studies and Scientific Research -
Basic Sciences and Engineering Studies.

Maulidin, A. (2018, January 22). Laporan Tugas plaxis. Diambil kembali dari Scribd:
https://www.scribd.com/document/369687307/Laporan-Tugas-Plaxis-alpin-Maulidin

Ou, C.-Y. (2006). Deep Excavation: Theory and Practice. London: Taylor & Francis Group.

PLAXIS 2D Manuals. (2018, March 23). Diambil kembali dari PLAXIS:

https://www.plaxis.com/support/manuals/plaxis-2d-manuals/