Geotechnical Engineering

Created by Ragib Nur Alam Shuvo, CE13

ragibnur.ce@gmail.com

AKH 10 year solve

Sub Soil Exploration

What is sub soil exploration? ’15 ’14 ’12 ’11 ‘10 ’09 ‘08 ’07 ‘06
Process of identifying the layers of soil deposits that underlie a proposed structure and their physical characteristics
is generally referred to as subsoil exploration.

What are the purposes of sub surface exploration? ’15 ’14 ’12 ’11 ‘10 ’09 ‘08 ’07 ‘06
❖ Determining nature of soil at site and its stratification.
❖ Obtaining disturbed and undisturbed soil sample for visual identification and appropriate laboratory tests.
❖ Determining depth and nature of bed rock.
❖ Assessing any special construction problems with respect to the existing structure.
❖ Determining position of water table.
❖ Evaluating load bearing capacity of the foundation.
❖ Estimating probable settlement of a structure.
❖ Establishing construction method for changing sub soil condition.
❖ Observing drainage condition from and into the site.
❖ Performing in situ field tests such as permeability test.
❖ Predicting lateral earth pressure.
❖ Selecting type and depth of foundation suitable for a given structure.
Surface exploration may also be necessary when addition and alteration to existing structures are contemplated.

What is N value? Discuss the importance of N value in geotechnical engineering. ’10 ’09 ‘08
N-Value:
In split spoon sampling, the sum of number of blows required for spoon penetration of last two 6 inch intervals is
referred to as standard penetration number at that depth

Significance of N value in geotechnical engineering:

• The consistency of clay soil can often be estimated from N value.

N value Consistency Created by

0-2 Very soft Ragib Nur Alam Shuvo,
2-5 Soft CE13
5-10 Medium Stiff ragibnur.ce@gmail.com
10-20 Stiff
20-30 Very Stiff
>30 Hard
• Co-relation between undrained shear strength of clay and N obtained from field, is given as,
𝐶𝑢 = 𝑘𝑁𝐹
2
Where, k = constant = 3.5 to 6.5 kN/m
• The approximate relationship between corrected N and relative density of sand.
•

𝐷𝑅 (%) = 11.7 + 0.76(222 𝑁60 + 1600 − 7.68𝜎 ′ 𝑜 − 0.50𝐶𝑢2 )0.5 − −(1)

Ncor DR (%)
0–5 0–5
5 – 10 5 – 30
10 – 30 30 – 60
30 – 50 60 – 95
 • The peak angle of friction of granular soil 𝜑 has correlation to the corrected N is given by wolff , 1989.
2
𝜑(deg) = 27.1 + 0.3Ncor − 0.00054Ncor
So N is useful guideline in soil exploration and provide a good evaluation of soil properties.
• Net allowable bearing capacity can be calculated from N
𝐷𝑒𝑝𝑡ℎ
For sand, 𝛽 = 𝑊𝑖𝑑𝑡ℎ 𝑜𝑓 𝑓𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

Ncor
(a). for β ≤ 4′ , φnet = 4
k/ft2 Created by
Ncor 2 Ragib Nur Alam Shuvo,
(b). for β > 6′ , φnet = 6
k/ft
2 CE13
For Clay , φnet = N × 0.15 ton/ft ragibnur.ce@gmail.com
What is Area Ratio?
Degree of disturbance of sample collected by various methods can be expressed by a term called area ratio, which is
given by

𝐷𝑜 2 − 𝐷𝑖 2
𝐴𝑟 (%) = × 100
𝐷𝑖 2
Here,

Do = Outside diameter of sampler

Di = Inside diameter of sampler
Ar = Area Ratio (ratio of disturbed area to the total area of soil)
A soil sample generally can be considered undisturbed if area ratio is less than or equal to 10%

13260000tk 1 crore 32 lakh 60 thousand 3tall (1100-1500tk pere square ft)

How approximate minimum depth of boring can be determined according to ASCE

recommendation? ’13
Approximate minimum depth of boring
Engineers may use rules established by American Society of Civil Engineers (1972)

ASCE recommendation for the determination of minimum depth of boring is given below,

• By determining the net increase of stress, ∆𝜎′ with depth under a foundation shown in following fig.

Δσ′ σ𝑜 ′
Fig. ∶ Determination of minimum depth of boring

• By estimating the variation of the vertical effective stress,𝜎𝑣 ′ with depth.

𝑞
• Then determining the depth, 𝐷 = 𝐷1 , at which the effective stress increase Δσ′ = . Where, q = estimated
10
net stress on the foundation.
 Δσ′
• Then by determining the depth, 𝐷 = 𝐷2 , at which σ ′ = 0.05
𝑣
• Unless bed rock is encountered, the smaller of two Depths 𝐷1 & 𝐷2 just determined is the approximate
minimum depth of boring required
If the preceding rules are used, the depths of boring for a building with a width of 30 m will be approximately the
following, according to Sowers and Sowers (1970):
Boring Depth
No. of stories
(m)
1 3.5
Created by
2 6
Ragib Nur Alam Shuvo,
3 10
CE13
4 16
5 24 ragibnur.ce@gmail.com

To determine the boring depth for hospitals and office buildings, Sowers and Sowers (1970) also used the following
rules.

• For light steel or narrow concrete buildings, 𝐷𝑏 = Depth of boring

𝐷𝑏 𝑆 = Number of stories
=𝑎 𝑎 = 3 if 𝐷𝑏 𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠
𝑆 0.7
• For heavy steel or wide concrete buildings,
6 if 𝐷𝑏 𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠
𝐷𝑏 𝑏={
=𝑏 20 if 𝐷𝑏 𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑓𝑒𝑒𝑡
𝑆 0.7
• When deep excavations are anticipated, the depth of boring should be at least 1.5 times the depth of
excavation.
• Sometimes, subsoil conditions require that the foundation load be transmitted to bedrock. The minimum
depth of core boring into the bedrock is about 3 m.
• If the bedrock is irregular or weathered, the core borings may have to be deeper.

Spacing:
• No hard and fast rule
• It depends on soil type and strata
• If soil strata are more or less uniform or unpredictable then more boreholes are needed.
• Following table gives some general guidelines

Spacing
Type of project
(m)
Multistory building 10-30
One-story industrial plants 20-60
Highways 250-500
Residential subdivision 250-500
Dams and dikes 40-80

How would you decide the depth of exploration and the extent of boring? ’15
How will you collect undisturbed sample from field? ’15 ’14
There are two ways;

a) Sampling by Thin Wall Tube

I. Used for obtaining fairly undisturbed samples.
II. Thin wall tubes are made of seamless, thin tubes and commonly are referred to as Shelby tubes
III. To collect samples at a given depth in a borehole, one first must remove drilling tools.
IV. Sampler is attached to drilling rod and lowered to bottom of borehole.
 V. After this, it is pushed hydraulically into soil.
VI. It then spun to shear off the base and is pulled out.
VII. Sampler with soil inside is sealed and taken to laboratory for testing.
VIII. Most commonly used thin wall tube sampler have outside diameters of 76.2 mm (3 in)

Di Do = 3 in

Figure: Thin wall tube

b) Sampling by Piston Sampler
I. Particularly useful when undisturbed sample are required. Created by
II. Consists of a thin wall tube with a piston. Ragib Nur Alam Shuvo,
III. Initially, piston closes end of thin wall tube. CE13
IV. Sampler first is lowered to bottom of borehole. ragibnur.ce@gmail.com
V. Thin-wall tube is pushed into soil hydraulically, past piston

Piston sampler:
(a) sampler at the bottom of
borehole;

Piston sampler:
(b) tube pushed into the soil
hydraulically
 VI. After this pressure is released through a hole in piston rod.
VII. Presence of piston prevents distortion in sample neither letting soil squeeze into sampling tube very
fast nor admitting excess soil.
VIII. Samples obtaining in this manner is consequently are disturbed less than those obtained by Shelby
tubes.

Why N60 value need to correct? ’15

Granular soil
Standard penetration number 𝑁60 obtained from field needs to be corrected for following cases;

• Correction for overburdened pressure

o In granular soils, value of N is affected by effective overburdened pressure 𝜎0 ′
o For that reason, value of 𝑁60 obtained from field exploration under different effective overburden
pressures should be changed corresponding to a standard value of 𝜎0 ′
(𝑁1 )60 = 𝐶𝑁 𝑁60
(𝑁1 )60 = Value of 𝑁60 corrected to a standard value of 𝜎0′ [100 𝑘𝑁/𝑚2 (2000 𝑙𝑏/𝑓𝑡 2 )]
𝐶𝑁 = Correction factor
o Several correlations have been developed over the years for the correction factor, 𝐶𝑁
o Most commonly cited relationships are those of Liao and Whitman (1986) and Skempton (1986)
o Liao and Whitman’s relationship (1986)
0.5
1
𝐶𝑁 = (𝑆𝐼 𝑢𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑠)
[ 𝜎0′ ]
(𝑝 )
𝑎

𝑊ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒, 𝜎0′ = Effective overburden pressure in kN/m2

𝑝𝑎 = Atmospheric pressure (≈ 100 kN/m2 )

1 Created by
𝐶𝑁 = √ ′ (𝐸𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑖𝑠ℎ 𝑢𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑠) Ragib Nur Alam Shuvo,
𝜎0
CE13
o Skempton (1986) relationship ragibnur.ce@gmail.com
▪ For SI Units
2
𝐶𝑁 = (Normally consolidated fine sand)
𝜎′
1 + ( 0)
𝑝𝑎
3
𝐶𝑁 = (Normally consolidated coarse sand)
𝜎′
2 + ( 0)
𝑝𝑎
1.7
𝐶𝑁 = (Overconsolidated sand)
𝜎′
0.7 + ( 0 )
𝑝𝑎
▪ For English Units
2
𝐶𝑁 = (Normally consolidated fine sand)
1 + 𝜎0′
3
𝐶𝑁 = (Normally consolidated coarse sand)
2 + 𝜎0′
1.7
𝐶𝑁 = (Overconsolidated sand)
0.7 + 𝜎0′

• Correction for submergence

o In very fine, silty, saturated sand an apparent increase in resistance occurs.
 o Terzaghi and Peck have recommended use of an equivalent penetration resistance (𝑁1 )60 in place of
actually observed value of 𝑁60 ,When 𝑁60 is greater than 15.
1
(𝑁1 )60 = 15 + (𝑁60 − 15)
2

When we use 𝑁𝑐𝑜𝑟𝑟 instead of N? ‘11

• 𝑁𝑐𝑜𝑟𝑟 will apply for sand and silt under submergence
• Will not apply for clay soil for having water Created by
• (𝑁1 )60 = 𝑁𝑐𝑜𝑟𝑟 = 𝐶𝑁 𝑁60 Ragib Nur Alam Shuvo,
CE13
Factors affecting the N value
ragibnur.ce@gmail.com
• Homogeneity of soil: Helps widely to get N
• Effective over burden pressure: granular soil
• Type of soil: Boulders, gravels due to them N value will be unreliable

Why N value need to correct

• Sandy soil resists penetration
• Silty soil varies for its physical significant