System reliability and sensitivity analysis of lateral loaded pile considering soil’s spatial variability

Probabilistic analysis has been widely used to assess the inherent uncertainty of variables in laterally loaded pile systems, but the calculation is still difficult and time-consuming. The present study presents an efficient probabilistic analysis framework for a laterally loaded pile system. The performance of the system is defined as the lateral deflection at the pile head and maximum bending moment of the pile shaft, corresponding to two failure modes. Within this framework, the spatial variability of the soil and the correlation between failure modes are considered by the random field theory and the First-Order Reliability Method, respectively. Moreover, the Sequential Compounding Method is used as an efficient tool to determine the system reliability indexes. The framework is confirmed by comparing the reliability indexes of failure modes and systems with those of the Monte Carlo Simulation Method. Furthermore, a parametric analysis and system sensitivity analysis are performed. The results show that the auto-correlation distance, allowable lateral displacement at the pile head, and allowable bending moment of the pile shaft have a great influence on reliability indexes of failure modes and system, and the major parameter of soil in affecting pile is the elastic modulus compared with the undrained shear strength.