Anchor Design Software for Circular Drilled Pier?

[RickyTheStructuralEngineer]

Every anchor design software that I'm aware of (i.e. Hilti Profis, Dewalt Design Assist, Simpson Strong Tie Anchor Designer) can't handle circular sections of concrete (i.e. drilled pier), and can only handle rectangular sections of concrete. Am I missing something here or is there another software people use for drilled piers? Or have one of these been finally updated and I'm not aware?

I know I can do the calc by hand and I also know that I can conservatively use a square with dimensions so that it fits within the circle (square circumscribed by the pier diameter), but have to imagine there's something out there. Or if there's another helpful workaround people have, it would be nice to know, thanks!

 

[JLNJ]

I'm guessing that figuring out the intersection of the cone frustrum for breakout is a little too complicated when one or more of the sides is curved.

 

[BridgeSmith]

For the structural analysis of drilled shafts/piers, I use the concrete column analysis module of our pier design software (BRASS-Pier). There are stand-alone column design programs available (SP Column, CsiCol, etc.)

Sorry, I just reread your post. Seems you're just looking to calculate for anchor embedment and breakout strength. Yeah, for that the easy and slightly conservative approach would be use an inscribed rectangular sized area. You have to make an assumption about the angle of the failure wedge, but then it's just a matter of drawing a straight line between where the failure lines intersect the curved face, and ignoring the concrete outside the line.

 

[jayrod12]

Agree with Bridgesmith, I don't really think there's a better way than using the conservative inscribed circle.

I guess there'd be a way for you to circumvent it by determining your anchor spacing and edge distances and make a rectangular model that matches, just not sure how that would work out in terms of effort level and accuracy. May be faster/easier to just go the conservative route.

 

[Aesur]

Not aware of a software that has circular concrete shapes built in, however about 10 years ago I built a spreadsheet doing this, wasn't that difficult figuring out the formulas for a circular shape instead of a square shape. Unfortunately, I cannot share the file as it was developed for a proprietary system.

 

[jhnblgr]

For sign structures I have used hand calculations taking into consideration the group of anchors and figuring the load for each bolt.
Look up monopole tower bases