SouthEast Asia Geo Conf in Kuala Lumpur

[BigH]

Well, tomorrow I am off to KL to attend a 3 day event starting on the 31st: the 19th SouthEast Asia Geotechnical Conference - my first one - but it is in the country where I am now working. Then the day after, get to attend a workshop led by Poulos on Pile Design and Construction. Should be interesting. I first "heard" of Poulos in 1973 when I had J Neil Kay as a professor at Cornell - - - as Kay was an Aussie, too. Looking forward to it.

Secondly, I am tinkering with writing a paper for a conference in Indonesia in September on soil modification. Typically this means to "improve" the soils to increase the bearing pressures, reduce settlement and the like. However, the paper I and Mr. Fred Matich are contemplating is one on modifying soil to its "weakest" condition as a means of construction expediency. Rolling surcharge is one such technique, blasting to remould a soft to firm soil for displacement, introducing a shear plane in a soil (as Fred did in New Orleans when they needed to sink a sunken ship in the shipping channel to a lower elevation.

One of the problems I have is that a few that I could write about - haven't yet gotten permissions - and am trying to see what I can get them . . . but was also wondering if any of my colleagues might have case histories or similar projects that I could, at the very least mention . . . or any help . . . it would be appreciated.

Cheers to all - have a great Memorial Weekend . . . . I am happy - the Cavs made it to the NBA Finals. Hopefully, this will be the year when this Cleveland fan can give a bit of a smile at the end of a season!

 

[Mccoy]

BigH, pls let us know if some interesting novelties are discussed during the conference and the piles workshop.
Also, a copy of the paper when ready will be appreciated.

Presently, I'm just over with the nightmare of 2 relocations in rental places and am back home even though the retrofitting works are still under way. I learnt a lot about such details and above all thermal insulation of buildings and climatization plants, my house being a isolated country house the heating bills were untolerable and I switched to a mixed biomass (wooden pellts) plus heat-pumps plants, plus total thermal insulation. The missus was also very thrilled with the prospect of changing the old bathrooms and pavings.
I did not try to reinforce the house seismically (a one story and a half structure), since that would have implied total demolition and reconstruction requiring an inordinate amount of money. That being recent light weight masonry and in the absence of local seismic resonance I'm going to be happy with that even though some details are not totally satisfactory.
In the meanwhile I've started a new book on site seismic response in the design of buildings, written together with a structural engineer. Still at chapter 2. Unfortunately that's in Italian but I'm, going to harass the publisher with the possibility of a translation.

http://www.mccoy.it

 

[PEinc]

Can't make it to KL. Please take notes for me, BigH.

http://www.PeirceEngineering.com

 

[BigH]

It was a wonderful conference. I attended an ICOLD conference in Bali a few years back and was disappointed; this was outstanding. The magnitude of the projects in Asia/Southeast Asia is mind-boggling . . . Land reclamation being what many countries are working on - Singapore for example.

Singapore has used sand in the past but Indonesia is putting a stop on exporting sand to Singapore . . . so they are looking into using clay slurry - well you can imagine the problems associated with this. Use of wick drains - yes but long time. Some have come up with using horizontal drains laid down after a "layer" of mud is placed, then put on a second layer of mud - then use vacuum dewatering of the horizontal drain to quicken up the consolidation. Doing this as the fills go up. Hinting that they can have a better handle on the amount of settlement left as they reach the "top". On the vertical drains - how high above the final level would you have to go to account for continued settlement??

Dr Harry Poulos gave an excellent talk on Piles at the conference - wished I had taped his lecture - the additional information that he provided beyond the notes was excellent - and I doubt that I had written down enough. The day after the conference he gave a workshop (6 lectures) on piled foundations - and I didn't make the same mistake. As they provided notes and slides in a nice booklet, I turned on my audio app on my cell phone and caught the complete lectures. I've listened to a portion and the audio is quite good.

Let me look into the proceedings a bit more and that - and I will be glad to post some additional items here - if the audio is good and not too big, I would be happy to make it available - by email or by posting a CD.

Back to the grind - but hoping to get on a bit of leave before the end of June - probably will go to BKK.

Cheers

 

[BigH]

PEinc. - you should make a trip over to Singapore . . . the excavation support measures are astounding. Of course the includes their continued push towards subways and also their land development for structures. Will try to find some pictures on this. Years ago 2007, 2009 and 2011, I attended a conference held in Singapore called "Underground Singapore" - good conferences and I enjoyed them. They didn't have one in 2013 or 2015 but I understand that one is planned for this year sometime in October or November. I will look into it.

McCoy - interesting about the house. I, too, am learning a lot on mechanical and "building" items here on the hydro project (i.e, tiling, painting, etc.) - sounds simple but with the "right" contractor a dog's breakfast.

 

[BigHarvey]

BigH - Anything about LWFS (Light Weight Foam Soils) since I have a doctoral student working on it at Bordeaux University ? These are mixes of dredged sédiments, cement and foaming agent (such as Elastizell). I had attended a conference on this subject at ISSMGE Paris conference in 2012 which started our own research project.

 

[BigH]

Yes, there was at least one paper that was on the subject. I have used Elaztizel on a project in Canada - can give you the main gist of it - but precise details are in storage. But one paper did use mixing of soil with the foaming agent. What's your email addy?? Or you can just email me directly - " bohicafries at gmail "

 

[BigH]

I found out after the conference that a soft copy of the proceedings wasn't included in the "package" - but am trying to chase it down - but I did find a reference to past conferences and they have some proceedings on line - some volumes are 900+ pages long - but they seem to have some good papers in them. For instance:

http://seags.ait.asia/publications/16th-SEAGC-Malaysia-2007.pdf

.

To access the 14th and 15th conference proceedings and more:

http://seags.ait.asia/category/publications/conference-proceedings/

 

[BigHarvey]

BigH

my email is herve.duplaine at balineau.fr

In France we have more and more problems to immerge dredged sédiments. This means that we have to bring them on shore. Transforming them in LWFS has a cost which can be partially offset by optimization of retaining structures like quay walls. We are trying to master the formulation of these materials (ie get a density and a resistance) though a PhD thesis.

 

[BigH]

BigHarvey - sent you off the paper - and got a reply (in French - and while I am Canadian, Je ne parles vous francais - and I don't read it either except for pois)! Can you advise me at bohicafries at gmail what to do??

 

[BigHarvey]

BigH

That was the anti-spam, but I got your mail and replied !