ALMITA & SCREW PILE INTRODUCTION

Charlie Street
Inside Sales
charlie.street@almita.com

Chris Boettcher
Business Development Manager
chris.boettcher@almita.com
 Agenda

• Safety Moment
• Introduction of the Company
• What is a Screw Pile?
• Almita’s Value Proposition
• Engineering and Design
• Fabrication
• Installation Equipment
• Various Applications
– shown through a series of project pictures
 KEY TAKE AWAYS

• Screw piles have been around for nearly 200

years – they are NOT new technology
• Screw pile applications have evolved and grown
immensely in the past years
• There is real science behinds screw piles
• Almita is an expert in this field – we have over
21 years of experience and our success stories
highlight how varied that experience is
 Biography – Charlie Street

I have being around Almita Piling Inc. since 2000

I have seen the screw pile industry go from 2 7/8” x 4’ anchor piles (2000lb
tension load) for service rigs, evolve to 20” x 40’ (160,000lb compressive
load) for the oil & gas industry.

Duties at Almita Piling Inc. have included:

Fabrication plant
Installation of screw piles
Shipping/receiving & inventory control
Estimator
Inside sales
 About Almita Piling Inc.
•Almita engineers, manufactures and installs screw piles in a
variety of industries and geographic markets. Screw pile
foundations is our core business and we are Canada’s leader in
this area.
•We currently have approximately 240 employees including 10
engineers within the geotechnical and structural discipline.
•The Almita engineering group is continually testing and publishing
papers, confirming the integrity of screw piles.
•Founding Member of IHPeng (Institute of Helical Pile Engineering)
England, New Zealand and Japan. Sharing of information on
engineering and design as it relates to screw piles with others
around the world.
Almita Head office in Ponoka
Manufacturing Facility - Ponoka
 Industries We Serve
Each Industry has a dedicated & qualified representative
• Oil & Gas
– Oilsands
– Facilities and Plantsites
– Oilfield Leases
– Pipelines
• Power Transmission and Distribution
– Tower and Pole Base Foundations
– Substations
– Solar Panel & Wind Tower Foundations
• Commercial Construction
– Work-Camp & Office Trailer Structures
– Camp and Light Industrial
– Streetlight and Sign bases
 SCREW PILE: structural elements that consist of one or more
helical shaped circular plate(s) affixed to a steel central shaft.

Installation
Drive Holes

PIPE SHAFT (Diameter

and Wall Thickness)

HELIX (Diameter
and Thickness)

Helix Pitch
PILE LENGTH

Helix Spacing

45°End Profile
 Advantages of Screw Piles

• No tailings, rebar, anchor bolts or bore lining

required
• No concrete curing time required
• Do not have to dewater casing
• Can be installed in all weather conditions
• Single stage installation
• Reclaimed with minimal ground disturbance
• No additional wall thickness required to facilitate
installation
• Usually requires shallower embedment depths
• Reduced material cost and faster install times
ExxonMobil Kearl Lake Load
Test Program
 ExxonMobil Kearl Lake Site
Comparison Between Measured and
Estimated Capacities – Axial Compression
Test Pile Ultimate Capacity Ultimate Capacity (5%) Prediction
ID Type Estimated Measured Ratio
Shaft Helix(es) Total Shaft Helix(es) Total
kN kN kN kN kN kN
ST6 4 287 1799 2086 360 1352 1912 1.09
ST7 3 287 1276 1563 430 1110 1540 1.01
ST9 1A 482 854 1336 280 844 1124 1.19
ST13 5 341 1746 2087 500 1792 2292 0.91
ST15 7 339 1946 2285 400 1800 2400 0.95

• Type 1A - 273Ø pipe x 10m long c/w [25PL x 610Ø Helix]

• Type 3 - 324Ø pipe x 10m long c/w [25PL x 762Ø Helix]
• Type 4 - 324Ø pipe x 10m long c/w [25PL x 762Ø Helix x2]
• Type 5 - 406Ø pipe x 10m long c/w [25PL x 914Ø Helix]
• Type 7 - 508Ø pipe x 10m long c/w [25PL x 1016Ø Helix]
Helix Failure Testing • At Bureau of Reclamation
Structures Lab, in Denver, CO.
• 5 million pound load apparatus
• Generally followed ICC-ES
AC358 for Helix testing
Helix Bending Model –
FEA (Finite Element Analysis)
Introduction to the design
principles of Screw Piles
 Helical (Screw )
Piles have been
incorporated into the
latest Edition of the
CFEM
-Almita was an advisor
Section 18.2.1.4
 Individual Helix Bearing
Method
Ultimate Compression Capacity (Qu)

Qt  Qshaft   Qi (bearing)
Shaft
Diameter Soil Surface

where
Shaft Friction
Qt = ultimate uplift
capacity
Qshaft = adhesion developed
along the steel shaft
Qi(bearing)
End Bearing
= sum of the bearing Capacity of
Individual
capacity of each Helixes

individual helix
 Compressive Capacity using
Cylindrical Shear Method
Ultimate Compression Capacity (Qu)

QC  Qshaft  Qhelix  Qbearing Shaft

Diameter Soil Surface
where
QC = ultimate compressive capacity
Qshaft = adhesion developed along Shaft Friction
the steel shaft
Qhelix = shearing resistance
mobilized along the Cylindrical
Helix
cylindrical failure surface Spacing Shearing
Resistance

Qbearing= bearing capacity of the bottom

helix
End Bearing Resistance
 Uplift Capacity of Helical Piles in CLAY

Shallow Helix Qt  A1Cu N u  Da Cu ( H 3  H1 )

Deep Helix Qt  A1Cu Nu  DaCu ( H 3  H1 )  Ps H1Ca

where
Qt = ultimate uplift capacity of the multi-helix screw pile
H1 = depth to top helix
H3 = depth to bottom helix
Da = average helix diameter
Ps = perimeter of anchor shaft
A1 = area of top helix
Nu = uplift bearing capacity factor for cohesive soils
Cu = undrained shear strength of the clay
Ca = average cohesion of soil along the pipe shaft
 Uplift Capacity of Helical Piles in SAND


Shallow Helix Qt   ' HAFq  Da ' ( H 23  H 21 ) Ku tan
2
Deep Helix 
Qt   ' HAFq *  Da ' ( H 3  H 1 ) K u tan  H eff  ' Ku tan 
2 2 Ps 2

2 2
where  = friction angle of the soil
A1 = area of the top helix
Fq = uplift capacity factor for cohesionless soils
H1 = depth to top helix
Da = average helix diameter
D1 = diameter of the top helix
H3 = depth to the bottom helix
Ps = perimeter of the screw pile shaft
 Torque Method

Qt  K t T
where
Kt = empirical factor
T = average installation torque
Kt = 33 m-1 for all square shafts and round
shaft anchors less than 89 mm in
diameter
Kt = 23 m-1 for 89 mm round shaft anchors
Kt = 9.8 m-1 for anchors with 219 mm
diameter shafts
HELIX DIAMETER vs. PIPE SHAFT
 R&D and Testing

1D
Accelerometer

3D
Accelerometer

• A Leader in screw pile research with the of U of A & UWO

• Continual R & D of our product
 Various Load Tests

Compression Test Tension Test

Lateral Tests
Introduction to Almita’s
fabrication principles of
Screw Piles
Fabrication
 WELDING

• Welding Conforms to CSA W59.1 and Almita is W47.1 with the

Canadian Welding Bureau (CWB)
• Structural Steel Members shall conform to CSA S16.1-94 (Limit
State Design) - Pipe (New) ASTM A252 Grade 2 or 3
 Robotic Welding

• To improve both speed and quality Almita has

invested in automating the Helix to Pipe weld.
 Helix Press and Die

• Structural Steel Members shall conform to CSA S16.1-94 (Limit

State Design)
– Plate (New) CSA G40.21 A36 or 44W
• Almita’s helical piles feature blades manufactured with a true
helix shape. The leading and trailing edges of true helix
blades are within one-quarter inch of parallel to each other
and any radial measurement across the blade is perpendicular
to the pile shaft. A true helix shape along with proper
alignment and spacing of the blades is critical to minimize soil
disturbance during installation.
“True Helix” “Duckbill”

• Conversely, blades that are not a true helix shape are often
pulled and not pressed into shape, creating a “duckbill”
appearance. Pulled plates do not conform to the True Helix
geometry requirements and their torque to capacity
relationship is not well documented.
 90
Almita’s °
“True Flight”
Helix

• Helix is pressed such that at any point around the

shaft the angle is 90°. Helix will thread into soil, not
churn or disturb.
 Introduction to Almita’s
equipment for Screw Pile
installation
List of Equipment
Small Skid Steer and Tracked Units
Installation Excavators
Agility and
Mobility in
restricted
access
locations
 Batter
Angles
(from
vertical to
horizontal)
 Extreme conditions!
-35°C +35°C

Muskeg Uneven Terrain

VARIOUS PROJECTS &
APPLICATIONS
Residential Construction
Garage Slab & Grade Beam
Residential Construction
Decks
Residential Development
Feature Wall
Residential Development
Boardwalk
Residential Development
Retaining Wall
Residential Construction
Winter Installation
 Solar Farm – Arnprior, ON

• 5 install crews;
• ~350 piles/day installed;
• 65 Semi-Truckloads of materials;
• 26,000 piles installed in less than 4
months;
• Finished 17 days ahead of schedule.
Industrial Housing and Work Camps
• Typically install
8-10/hr.

• 114mm -178mm
dia. pipe and
usually 6-7m
long.

• Project sizes
range from a
few 100 piles to
>1000 piles.
Commercial - Steel Buildings
Elevated Pipeline Supports
 Various Oil & Gas Applications
More Uses:
Pipe Racking
Separators
Flare Stacks
De-Hydrators
Compressors

Facility Work Tank Farms

Bullet Tank Pumpjacks

 Oil & Gas Application - Pipelines

Client: StatoilHydro
Canada
Location: Leismer, AB
Conditions:
Deep areas of Muskeg
Over Clay Till, Bearing
depth @ 10m
From Concept to Installation – Elevated pipelines
324mm and Pipeline Guide Posts
406mm pipes
used for these
50-90kN Lateral
Forces
Piperacks
 Elevated Supports
Irathane pipeline,
Suncor, Fort McMurray, AB
1360 piles in three Phases
324mm x 7m pipe
c/w 25 x 610mm dia. Helix
Anchor Thrust Block
Transmission Tower
Tower Foundation Retro-Fit

Manitoba
Hydro Line
Tangent Pole Bases (Distribution)
Pile Groups on Tower Structures
 QUESTIONS?

Charlie Street
Inside Sales
Charlie.street@almita.com

Chris Boettcher
Business Development Manager
chris.boettcher@almita.com