Abstract
The force for pulling down large, steel monolith tanks was measured for a fine sandy loam, a silt loam, and clay loam soil with varying soil water contents in two of the soils. Pressure gages on hydraulic jacking equipment were used to measure force as a function of depth throughout the 2.4-m installation depth of the soil monolith tanks. Monolith tank areas were 0.75 1.00 m or 3.00 3.00 m, and the tank wall thickness was 9.5 mm. Except for the effects of natural hard pans or plow pans, pulldown force was linearly related to depth. When pulldown force was converted to wall friction, the average wall friction after wetting for each of the three soils was about 20 kPa. For most agricultural soils without rocks or cemented layers, the monolith tank wall friction from prewetted soil should also be less than 20 kPa. Wall friction variability decreased with depth so that a safety factor of 1.25 would be satisfactory in designing monolith collection equipment.
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
