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Improvement of Bearing Capacity of Stone Columns: An Analytical Study

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Ground Improvement and Reinforced Soil Structures

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Civil Engineering ((LNCE,volume 152))

Abstract

Stone columns increase the bearing capacity and reduce the compressibility of soft clayey soil. However, the use of stone columns is limited because of subsequent settlement upon loading. The settlement is due to the bulging of the stone columns. Hence the major application includes strengthening of embankment foundation, oil tank foundation, etc., where a large settlement is permitted. In case the bulging of a stone column is restricted, its use may include building a foundation also. In the present study, a soil-cement bed is placed over the stone columns to reduce the bulging effect of the stone columns. Numerical analysis based on Plaxis-2D is conducted to observe the behavior of soil-cement bed and stone columns. The analysis is conducted on both Ordinary Stone Columns (OSCs) and stone columns underlying Soil-Cement Bed (SCB). From the result of this study, it is observed that the use of soil-cement bed reduces the bulging effect and increases the load-carrying capacity more than two times. The degree of improvement depends on the thickness of the SCB. As such an optimum thickness is obtained by trial and error. The settlement at the maximum bearing capacity is also found to be a bare minimum. The group effect of the stone columns is also studied. The bulging of the stone columns in a group is not similar to that in a standalone condition. It suggests that the existing theory on the determination of bearing capacity of composite soil must be modified for a group. A limited number of small-scale laboratory studies was also conducted to verify the analytical results.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Civil Engineering Department, ITER, SOA Deemed to Be University, Bhubaneswar, 751030, Odisha, India

    Manita Das

  2. Civil Engineering Department, NIT, Silchar, 788010, Assam, India

    Ashim Kanti Dey

Authors
  1. Manita Das
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  2. Ashim Kanti Dey
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Geotechnical Engineering Division, Department of Civil Engineering, Andhra University College of Engineering, Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, India

    C. N. V. Satyanarayana Reddy

  2. Geotechnical Engineering Division, Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Hyderabad, Telangana, India

    Sireesh Saride

  3. Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh, India

    A. Murali Krishna

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Das, M., Dey, A.K. (2022). Improvement of Bearing Capacity of Stone Columns: An Analytical Study. In: Satyanarayana Reddy, C.N.V., Saride, S., Krishna, A.M. (eds) Ground Improvement and Reinforced Soil Structures. Lecture Notes in Civil Engineering, vol 152. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-1831-4_27

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-1831-4_27

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore

  • Print ISBN: 978-981-16-1830-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-981-16-1831-4

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