USED B.I. PIPES: AN ALTERNATIVE LOW COST DEEP FOUNDATION FOR LOW RISE BUILDINGS Salvador R.

Aldecoa, MSCE, MMSt, M.ASEP Abstract

This paper intends to present experiences in the utilization of used B.I. pipes as alternative low cost deep foundation for low rise buildings on tight areas and on difficult ground conditions where poor and unstable soil materials lie at practical depths for shallow foundations. Case studies are discussed on projects which are located in the Commercial Business District (CBD) of Naga City where soil sediments consist of a succession of an upper very loose clayey sands (about 2.0 meters thick) and the underlying very soft clayey silt / sand clay formation which extends down to about 6.50 meter thick below present ground surface. The establishment of pile installation criteria using pile driving formulas and the applicable factor of safety (FS) is critically discussed. Comparative analysis on the pile capacity using static analysis, pile driving formulas and static pile testing are presented. Finally, the simplicity and the economics behind the alternative deep foundation method are presented. Keywords Pile design loads; soil investigations; static analysis; ultimate pile capacity; driven piles; pile installation; pile driving formula; static load tests.

Introduction In the early nineties, economy and business opportunities in the commercial district of Naga City started to appreciate, new businesses emerged and construction of low rise building grew rapidly to its peak. With the onset of this rapid development in construction industry, numerous cases of old buildings undergoing a tremendous and detrimental foundation settlement adjacent to a newly constructed low rise structure have emerged. With this scenario, a massive campaign from the building official to conduct sub-surface investigation produced more than one hundred boreholes within the commercial district of Naga City. Based on these boring logs, local practicing engineers found out that only deep foundation can prevent the said failure to occur in future constructions. But, the problems remain unsolved for

the following reasons; (a) the building areas were too narrow to accommodate heavy equipments like crane; (b) old structures surrounding the project site cannot withstand a continuous ground quake inherent to large scale pile driving; and (c) soil stabilization would be more expensive, time-consuming and messy. With these constraints, the author introduced a crude way of pile driving technique that solves problems (a) and (b) without sacrificing the stability and safety of the building. With this simple innovation, over 8,000 used B.I. / G.I. pipes have been installed as pile foundation for various low rise structures within Naga City for the past ten years. Site Condition Naga City is located at the central portion of the province of Camarines Sur with approximate coordinates of 123o 11.4 East Longitude and 13o 36.8 North Latitude. Recent deposits are extensive alluvial deposits of clay, sand and gravel which occupy the lower valleys of rivers and flood plains of the province. They consist of loose aggregate of gravel, sand and silt that were derived from older rocks. They are either deposited by floods, rivers and wave action along river courses, floodplains, and coastal areas. Downtown Naga City is well-known to be underlain by soft fluvial sediments believed to be deposited thru siltation from the various rivers and streams traversing the city. These sediments consist of very loose clayey sands (about 2.0 meters thick) and the underlying very soft clayey silt / sandy clay formation which extends down to about 6.50 meters thick below present ground surface. It is evident from the results of numerous sub-surface investigations that poor and unstable soil materials lie at practical depths for shallow foundations. Geotechnical Pile Capacity Typically, a sub-surface investigation will established and identify the soil conditions, mechanical properties of soil, suitable bearing layers, length of piles and potential geotechnical problems. The ultimate load-carrying capacity of a pile is given by a simple equation:

Qu = Q p + Q s where Qu = ultimate pile capacity Qp = load-carrying capacity of the pile point Qs = frictional resistance Point Bearing Capacity, Qp The ultimate resistance per unit area developed at the pile tip is qp = c N*c + q N*q and Qp = Ap qp where Ap = area of pile tip c = cohesion of the soil supporting the pile tip qp = unit point resistance q = effective vertical stress at the level of the pile tip N*c, N*q = the bearing capacity factors Frictional Resistance, Qs The frictional or skin resistance of a pile may be written as Qs = p L f Where p = perimeter of the pile section L = incremental pile length over which p and f are taken constant f = unit friction resistance at any depth z

(1)

(2) (3)

(4)

The theoretical approach, however, is practically impossible to apply due to the difficulty in accurately predicting the effects of pile installation on the various soil parameters in the above equations (Broms, 1978). The basic approach is to use conservative values of soil parameters together with an arbitrary safety factor to give preliminary estimates of pile capacity, length and diameter. Tomlinson (1979) reported that the use of safety factors greater than 2.5 would generally ensure that immediate settlement at the working load is less than 10mm.

Use of In-Situ Test Meyerhof (1956) has correlated the shaft and base resistances of a pile with the results of a standard penetration test. For small displacement piles, Pu = 4 Np Ab + ( As ) / 100 where Ab = net sectional area of toe ( sq.ft. ) As = gross surface area of shaft ( sq.ft. ) Np = standard penetration number, N, at pile base = average value of N along pile shaft In Eq. 5, the recommended upper limit of the unit shaft resistance ( / 100 ) is 0.50 ton/sq.ft. The above equation have also been used with some success in stiff clays (Bromham and Styles, 1971) Concrete-Filled Steel Pipe Piles The capacity of concrete-filled steel pipe piles shall follow the provisions stated in NSCP C101-01, Section 307 Piles Specific Requirements; 307.7.1 Material. The steel pipe of concrete-filled steel pipe piles shall conform to one of the material specifications listed in Section 501.3. The concrete in concrete-filled steel pipe piles shall have a specified compressive strength fc of not less than 17.50 MPa. 307.7.2 Allowable stresses. The allowable axial stresses shall not exceed 0.35 of the minimum specified yield strength Fy of the steel plus 0.33 of the specified compressive strength fc of concrete, provided Fy shall not be assumed greater than 250 MPa for computational purposes. Exception: When justified in accordance with Section 306.12, the allowable stresses may be increased to 0.50 Fy. (5)

307.7.3 Minimum dimensions. Driven piles of uniform section shall have a nominal outside diameter of not less than 200mm. Steel Pipes Specification: Ideally, steel pipes shall conform to ASTM standards for steel pipe & structural tubing, either standard, extra strong or double-extra strong structural steel pipe.

MINIMUM VALUES Nominal Diameter d = 140 mm Wall thickness t = 3.50 mm Minimum Length L = 6.0 m Corrosion scale less than 1.50 mm Figure 1 Used B.I. Pipes 6-1/2 diameter However, surplus or used Black Iron (B.I.) or Galvanized Iron (G.I.) pipes ( Figure 1 ) can be used as an alternative. These can be found in oil & gas company, water utility company, mill factory, manufacturers of steel pipes and even in junk shops. They are considered junk items and are being sold at a per kilo basis, much lower than its original selling price. Piling Equipment Specification: The author recommends mechanically assembled piling equipment (Figure 2) with the following specifications:

PILING EQUIPMENT Minimum Ram Weight W = 400 kgs. Minimum Drop Height h = 3.0 meters Manually Propelled. Motor Driven Pile Hammer

Figure 2 Mechanically assembled piling equipment

Method of Pipe Preparation & Installation Figure 3 Figure 4

Step 1 Thermal cutting of pipe end

Step 2 Welding of pipe end to pencil cut form

Figure 5

Figure 6

Step 3 Pitching and driving of piles

Step 4 Splicing of extension piles

Concreting, Installation of Dowels & pilecap rebars Figure 7 Figure 8

Step 5 Cutting to finish level, dewatering and welding of dowels

Step 6 Pouring of concrete in-fill

Figure 9

Step 7 Installation of pilecap rebars & column rebars Pile Driving Formulae Perhaps the oldest and most frequently used method of estimating the load capacity of driven piles is to use a driving formula, or dynamic formula (Poulus & Davis, 1980). The most widely known and simplest of these formulas is the Engineering News Formula (ENF) given below; Ru = 12 W h / ( s + 0. 1 ) where Ru = ultimate pile capacity W = ram weight h = ram drop height s = permanent set or pile penetration per blow The primary objective in using a pile-driving formula is usually either to establish a safe working load for a pile by using the driving record of the pile, or to determine the driving requirements for a required working load (Poulus & Davis, 1980). 8 ( 6)

The popularity of using pile driving formulas on small jobs is due mainly to their simplicity, rather than accuracy (Hussein et. al. 1988). That is why, a factor of safety (FS) that ranges from 2 to 6 is recommended to compensate the inaccuracies inherent to the formula. To improve the predictions of pile driving formulas for a particular project, Hussein, et., al. (1988) proposed that a pile driven according to a dynamic formula should be load tested, whereby the constants and parameters used in the dynamic formula can be adjusted to produce agreement with the load test.

CASE STUDY No. 1

new building

existing building

Figure 10

Figure 11 (spt of adjacent bldg.)

CASE STUDY No. 2

new building

existing building

Figure 12 CASE STUDY No. 3

Figure 13 (spt of adjacent property)

new building

existing building

Figure 14

Figure 11

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Proposed Solution: a. Utilizing the mechanically assembled piling equipment (Figure 2) as substitute for heavy equipment like crane can manage to maneuvers in tight areas. b. With the use of B.I. pipes piles, deep foundation can be achieved at a minimal cost. c. B.I. pipes are considered small displacement piles, thus, ground quakes were negligible during pile driving operations. Cost per driven pile Material Cost 6-1/2 dia. x 6.0m surplus B.I. pipe total weight = 120.00 kgs/pc unit price = P45.00/kg (freight included) amount per meter = P900.00 Labor Cost pencil cutting, welding, splicing & other consumables 15% of Material Cost additional cost per meter = P135.00 Pile Driving Cost 6-1/2 dia. x 6.0m surplus B.I. pipe amount per meter = P300.00 Profit & Taxes additional cost per meter = P165.00 COST PER METER OF DRIVEN PILE = P 1500.00 Average Pile Capacity = 8 tons/pile

Conclusion Foundation on tight areas and on difficult ground conditions for low rise buildings can be carried out with minimal risk on the adjoining properties. It eliminates the risk of lateral soil movement from beneath the foundation of adjoining structure during foundation excavation and dewatering. The proposed method, eliminates the need of heavy equipment, such as, cranes, bored piling and jet grouting equipment. Adopting this as an alternative low cost deep foundation for low rise buildings results to a more economical, stable and sound foundation.

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REFERENCES NSCP C101-01 (2001) National Structural Code of the Philippines 2001, Buildings, Towers, and Other Vertical Structures, Vol. 1, Third Edition, 2001. Buensuceso, B.R.,Jr. (1999) Pile Analysis, Installation, Testing and Construction Control, Proceedings, 1st National Symposium on Geotechnical Engineering. Poulus, H.G. and Davis, E. H. (1980) Pile Foundation Analysis and Design, John Wiley & Sons, New York. Das, B. M. (1995) Principles of Foundation Engineering, Third Edition, PWS Publishing Company, Boston, MA. ASTM (1981) Standard Test Method for Piles Under Static Axial Compressive Load, ASTM Designation D1143-81. AASHTO (1992) Standard Specification for Highway Bridges, Fifteen Edition.

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