Installation of spudcan foundations in layered soils: Centrifuge test and numerical analysis

Copyright © 2015 by the International Society of Offshore and Polar Engineers (ISOPE). This paper addresses spudcan penetration in stiff-over-soft clay, the reverse and multilayer deposits. Centrifuge model tests and large deformation finite element (LDFE) analyses were undertaken to provide insight into spudcan foundation behavior during vertical penetration through layered soils. The model tests included half-spudcan tests against a transparent window, allowing the soil flow to be captured continuously by a digital camera and subsequently quantified through particle image velocimetry (PIV) analysis, and separate full-spudcan tests to measure the penetration resistance. LDFE analyses were carried out using the Coupled Lagrangian-Eulerian (CEL) approach. The clay was modeled using the extended elastic-perfectly plastic Tresca soil model allowing strain softening and rate dependency. Two critical aspects of spudcan behavior: punch-through and squeezing were highlighted in relation to current predictive methods in the ISO standard 19905-1, which were implemented through a self-developed user interface.