Numerical study of relationships between the cone resistances and footing bearing capacities in silica and calcareous sands

Abstract

The tip resistances measured within the cone penetration tests were presented to estimate the footing bearing capacities under axial loading. Most of the existing correlations were established in terms of silica sands, while the data for calcareous sands were limited. Calcareous sands in situ are featured with higher internal friction angle, and the particles are very irregular in shape. This study supplemented the data from calcareous sand and a direct method for evaluating footing bearing capacities was proposed for both the silica and calcareous sands, which accounted for the type and relative density of sand and the size, shape and embedment ratio of footing. It overcomes the significant uncertainties and complications in the classical bearing capacity method. Two large deformation finite element approaches, the Abaqus finite element package utilizing the Arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian and the Coupled Eulerian-Lagrangian method are used to simulate the cone penetration tests and footing load tests, respectively. A modified Mohr-Coulomb model is incorporated to describe the strain-softening response and the dependence of shear modulus on stress level of silica and calcareous sands.