Eng-Tips is the largest engineering community on the Internet

Intelligent Work Forums for Engineering Professionals

  • Congratulations waross on being selected by the Eng-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!

Piles & Overburden

Status
Not open for further replies.

LearnerN

Civil/Environmental
Sep 9, 2010
102
US
I've been reading the PE reference manual about piles. It says "For piles supporting a compressive load, the pile weight is balanced by the overburden and is not considered." What does this mean exactly?
 
Replies continue below

Recommended for you

The ultimate bearing capacity of a pile (Qp) is equal to Qs (shaft resistance) plus Qb (base resistance) less the weight of the pile (Wp). With respect to your question, rather than use my own words, to quote Tomlinson: "Usually Wp is small in relation to Qp [ultimate bearing capacity of the pile] and it is often neglected because it is not much greater than the weight of the displaced soil. However, it must be taken into account for marine piling where a considerable proportion of the pile length extends above the sea-bed."
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Part and Inventory Search

Sponsor

Back
Top