Full Scale Crash Test on a Group of Piles in Clay

Abstract

This paper presents a full scale test on a pile group as part of a study on the lateral behavior of groups of piles subjected to impact loads. In recent years, pile groups have been installed as an efficient system to protect structures such as bridge piers, offshore platforms and significant buildings against extreme horizontal loads from ships or vehicles. There has been a crucial need to design such impact resisting structures embedded in soils. One of the most effective tools to understand the soil behavior during impacts is a full scale crash test. These tests are rare as they are expensive and difficult to run. This paper presents part of a comprehensive study on a group of four piles embedded 2 m in hard clay, connected together with two beams, and designed to arrest a 2,300 kg pickup truck with an approaching velocity of 100 km/h. In order to monitor the behavior of the piles and beams, the instrumentation included accelerometers on the truck, strain gages on the piles and high speed cameras for displacement. Such full scale tests can provide valuable data for calibration of analytical or numerical models. The details of the full scale test along with the measured response are presented.