Influence of Spudcan Penetration on Adjacent Skirted Foundation in Uniform Clay
Publication: Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 149, Issue 9
Abstract
Spudcans are commonly installed to support jack-up vessels in construction process of offshore wind turbines (OWTs), which may induce significant soil deformation that may impact existing foundations of established OWTs. Large-deformation finite-element (LDFE) analyses were performed to investigate movements of an adjacent skirted foundation induced by spudcan penetration. A LDFE model was generated and compared with a centrifuge test and good agreement was achieved. A detailed parametric study was then undertaken to examine the influence of spudcan penetration depths, spudcan–skirt clearance, soil shear strength, and foundation skirt length ratios. The outcome of this study leads to a conclusion that the behavior of the impacted skirt is closely related to soil flow mechanisms around the skirted foundation induced by spudcan penetration. The clearance distance between the spudcan and the skirt is the key factor. Significant skirt rotation occurs when the spudcan is less than one diameter distance from the skirt, especially for a short skirt installed in stiff clay. The soil flow mechanisms around the spudcan and skirted foundation are presented and approximating expressions for estimating the maximum rotation of skirt during spudcan penetration are proposed based on intensive numerical modeling results.
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Data Availability Statement
Some or all data, models, or code that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Acknowledgments
The first two authors were supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 42276213), Special Fund Project of Six Major Marine Industries in 2022 (GDNRC[2022]27), Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation (2021A1515010828 and 2020A1515410001), Key-Area Research and Development Program of Guangdong Province (No. 2020B0101130009), and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (D2220740 and 2022ZYGXZR011). The second author is the recipient of Chinese Government Scholarship, China Scholarship Council (CSC 202206150024).
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Volume 149 • Issue 9 • September 2023
Copyright
© 2023 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Aug 4, 2022
Accepted: Apr 12, 2023
Published online: Jun 24, 2023
Published in print: Sep 1, 2023
Discussion open until: Nov 24, 2023
ASCE Technical Topics:
- Clays
- Coasts, oceans, ports, and waterways engineering
- Continuum mechanics
- Deformation (mechanics)
- Engineering fundamentals
- Engineering mechanics
- Finite element method
- Foundation construction
- Foundations
- Geomechanics
- Geotechnical engineering
- Geotechnical investigation
- Machine foundations
- Methodology (by type)
- Numerical methods
- Ocean engineering
- Offshore structures
- Penetration tests
- Soil deformation
- Soil mechanics
- Soils (by type)
- Solid mechanics
- Structural mechanics
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Cited by
- Haojia Cheng, Fujun Niu, Mi Zhou, Xihong Zhang, Yinghui Tian, Jinhui Li, Bearing Capacity of Hybrid Skirted Foundations in Silty Sand-over-Clay under Combined VHM Loading, International Journal of Geomechanics, 10.1061/IJGNAI.GMENG-9283, 24, 8, (2024).