Ultimate lateral resistance of tripod pile foundation in clay

Abstract

In this paper we investigate the effect of pile group geometry and loading direction on the ultimate lateral soil resistance developing on a tripod foundation, using numerical and analytical upper bound methods. Two distinct kinematic mechanisms are established, corresponding to different failure modes associated with wide and narrow pile spacing. A comparison of tripod group performance against other common pile group layouts suggests that the former results in optimal efficiency for cases when the direction of the lateral load is unknown, such as the foundation of offshore structures subjected to wind, wave and ocean current loads.