Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197

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Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering

journal homepage: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/soildyn

Critical buckling load of pile in liquefied soil

Xiaoyu Zhang a, b, Liang Tang b, *, Xianzhang Ling b, Andrew Chan c
a
School of Civil Engineering, Guangzhou University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, 510006, China
b
School of Civil Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, Heilongjiang, 150090, China
c
School of Engineering, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania, 7001, Australia

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Buckling instability has been recently identified as a possible mechanism of pile failure in liquefiable deposits
Liquefaction and this failure mechanism is not explicitly mentioned in most design codes. To carry out routine design and
Pile foundation checking, it is necessary to reliably estimate the critical buckling load of pile for a given liquefiable site. How­
Buckling instability
ever, the existing calculation methods for the critical buckling load of pile in liquefied soils do not consider the
Critical buckling load
BNWF model
influence of geometric imperfections and nonlinear behavior of the pile. In this paper, an efficient approach using
the Beam on Nonlinear Winkler Foundation (BNWF) model is proposed to calculate the critical buckling load of
pile in liquefied soils considering geometric imperfections and nonlinear behavior of the pile. The method is
verified and validated using the finite element method and results from centrifuge tests. Furthermore, parametric
analysis has been carried out to understand the influence of buckling load for different soil relative density,
initial geometric imperfections of pile, flexural rigidity of pile, and pier height. It is found that the critical
buckling load of pile in liquefied soils increases with the increase of soil relative density and flexural rigidity of
pile, and decreases with the increase of initial geometric imperfections of pile and pier height. Finally, a
simplified estimation method based on Euler buckling theory is provided for predicting critical buckling load of
pile in liquefied soils and an example is taken to show the application.

1. Introduction
Extensive damage to pile foundations in liquefiable soils has been
observed in many strong earthquakes, such as the collapse of the pile-
supported Showa Bridge during the 1964 Niigata earthquake [1–3]. In
order to reduce liquefaction damage to pile foundations, many attempts
have been made to explore the seismic response of pile foundations in
liquefiable soils, and various design guidelines have been formulated,
such as JRA (2017), Eurocode 8: part 5 (1998), and USA code [4–7].
Recently, buckling instability has been cited as a possible mechanism
of pile failure in liquefiable soils [8–11]. When the soil around the pile
loses much of its stiffness and strength owing to liquefaction, the pile
will become an unsupported long slender column and could buckle
under the high axial load from the superstructure. The buckling failure
mechanism has already been confirmed by centrifuge tests, case his­
tories, and analytical works [4,8,12,13]. However, consideration of this
failure mechanism is currently missing in all design codes [1]. There­
fore, to improve the design code of the pile, it is essential to accurately
calculate the critical buckling load of pile, which could avoid the
buckling instability of pile in liquefiable soils under strong earthquakes.
So far, only a few researchers have devoted efforts to study the
calculation of critical buckling load of pile in liquefied soils. Shanker
et al. [14] proposed an analytic method to predict the critical buckling
load of pile based on an extension of the Mindlin solution, and the pile
and the surrounding soil are assumed to be elastic. Nadeem et al. [15]
investigated the buckling response of straight and initially
bent-end-bearing piles without considering soil liquefaction through the
finite element method. Knappett and Madabhushi [16] studied the
buckling behavior of pile groups using the Riks post-buckling analysis
method, which is implemented in ABAQUS, but did not significantly
consider the influence of geometric imperfections of pile (i.e., errors in
installation or manufacturing defects). Moreover, some studies, such as
Bhattacharya [17], Haldar et al. [18], and Haldar and Babu [19], treat
the pile in liquefied zone as laterally unsupported slender columns and
use the Euler’s buckling formula to calculate the critical buckling load of
pile, without considering the influence of the residual shear strength of
liquefied soil and the nonlinear behavior of pile. To the best of the au­
thors’ knowledge, no studies have been reported yet on the calculation
of critical buckling load of pile in liquefied soils considering the influ­
ence of geometric imperfections and pile nonlinear behavior

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: xiaoyu@gzhu.edu.cn (X. Zhang), hit_tl@163.com (L. Tang), lingxianzhang@hit.edu.cn (X. Ling), andrew.chan@utas.edu.au (A. Chan).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soildyn.2020.106197
Received 20 December 2019; Received in revised form 13 March 2020; Accepted 24 April 2020
Available online 5 May 2020
0267-7261/© 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
X. Zhang et al.
simultaneously. However, these factors have a significant influence on
the critical buckling load of pile [14–16]. Therefore, it is necessary to
propose a more accurate calculation method of the critical buckling load
of pile in liquefied soils.
In this study, a method for calculating the critical buckling load of
pile in liquefied soil is proposed based on the BNWF model. This method
takes into consideration the material and geometric nonlinearities of
pile, soil liquefaction, and geometric imperfections of pile. The method
is then verified by the results of finite element method and centrifuge
tests. The effect of soil relative density, initial geometric imperfections
of pile, flexural rigidity of pile, and pier height on the critical buckling
load of pile has been studied. Finally, simplified calculating formulae on
the critical buckling load of pile in liquefied soils are presented and
verified by the centrifuge test results.
2. Calculation of critical buckling load using BNWF method
A method for calculating the critical buckling load of pile in liquefied
soil is proposed in this section. This method is based on the BNWF model
(Fig. 1a). All the numerical simulations were performed using the Open
System for Earthquake Engineering Simulation, OpenSees (http://op
ensees.berkeley.edu [20]).
2.1. p-y modeling of liquefied soil
As observed by Bhattacharya et al. [9], Knappett and Madabhushi
[16], and Zhang et al. [11], buckling failure of the end-bearing pile
normally occurs when the soil is fully liquefied. And pile buckling in
partially liquefied soil would require a higher buckling load than that in
the fully liquefied soil. In other words, when predicting the critical
buckling load of pile in liquefiable soils, only the soil that has fully been
liquefied needs to be considered. Therefore, in this study, only the p-y
curve for liquefied soil is used to calculate the critical buckling load of
pile.
In this BNWF model, the interaction between the soil and the pile
was modeled using discrete non-linear springs represented by p-y curves
for lateral loading (Figs. 1a and b), where p refers to the lateral soil
pressure per unit length of the pile, and y refers to the corresponding
relative soil-pile horizontal displacement [22]. The p-y curve (Fig. 1b)
proposed by Dash et al. [21] is adopted in the present study. In contrast
with the other p-y curves, the p-y curves proposed by Dash et al. [21]
Fig. 1. Numerical model: (a) Schematic of BNWF model; and (b) full lique­
faction p-y curves (after Dash et al., 2017 [21]).
2
Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197
retain the essential features of liquefied soil, including practically zero
strength and stiffness at low strains, and strain-hardening behavior at
large strains [21,22]. On the other hand, this p-y curve can be easily
constructed from a typical field bore log data, which could be conve­
niently used by the designer [21,22]. The p-y curve is given by Eq. (1).
� � �
p1 pu þ p1 pu p1 2π yu þ y1 �
p ¼ ω y þ Að1 ωÞ þ tanh y (1)
y1 2 2 3ðyu y1 Þ 2
where pu is ultimate lateral resistance, yu is ultimate lateral displace­
ment, p1 is initial lateral resistance, y1 is initial lateral displacement, A ¼
0 for y ¼ 0, A ¼ 1 for y6¼0, and ω is a weight function can be calculated
from Eq. (2).
� � � ���
1 6π 4y1 þ yu
ω ¼ 1 tanh y (2)
2 yu 6
The specific methods for calculating pu, yu, p1, and y1, from the field
bore log data can be referred to Dash et al. [21].
2.2. Nonlinear modeling of pile
The pile was simulated as displacement-based nonlinear beam-
column elements [20]. The pile nodes are created with three di­
mensions and six degrees of freedom (three translational and three
rotational). A moment-curvature relationship can be defined for an in­
elastic pile section in simulating its nonlinear material response [23]. A
“Corotational transformation” was adopted to consider geometric
nonlinearity of pile [23,24], which has been confirmed can be used
effectively in detecting the buckling load as reported by Denavit and
Hajjar [25].
2.3. Geometric imperfections of pile
In reality, piles are not perfectly straight and usually have some
geometric imperfections that may affect their buckling behavior [15].
Therefore, it is necessary to consider the geometric imperfections when
calculating the critical buckling load of piles. As reported by Nadeem
et al. [15], there are two typical initially bent profiles could be used
considering the geometric imperfections, i.e., quarter sine profile, as
represented by Eq. (3) (Fig. 2a), and half sine profile, as in Eq. (4)
(Fig. 2b). The initial imperfection amplitude (a) was defined to describe
the imperfection magnitude, as shown in Fig. 2. In the numerical
modeling, these two initially bent profiles could be described by
defining the node coordinates of pile, and the x-coordinate can be
Fig. 2. Two typical initially bent pile profiles: (a) Quarter sine profile; and (b)
Half sine profile (after Nadeem et al. [15]).
X. Zhang et al.
calculated from Eqs. (3) and (4) as:
πy
x ¼ a sin (3)
2L
x ¼ a sin
πy
(4)
L et al. [15] is shown in Fig. 4. The PE in Fig. 4 is the Euler buckling load of
where a is the initial imperfection amplitude, L is the length of pile
(Fig. 2).
2.4. Prediction of critical buckling load
A BNWF model considering the material and geometric non­
linearities of pile, soil liquefaction, and geometric imperfections of pile
can be established using the above method. In this model, the spacing of
soil springs is taken as 0.25 m, which is based on the research of Dash
et al. [4] and Lombardi and Bhattacharya [26]. The parameters of soil
springs are computed from the value of relative density of the soil, unit
weight of the soil, pile diameter, pile length, and so on, using the
approach suggested in Dash et al. [21] and Lombardi et al. [22]. Based
on this model, nonlinear buckling analysis was performed by applying a
displacement-controlled axial compression on the pile head [27]. Then,
a complete axial-load versus axial pile-head deflection curve (i.e., the
well-known load-deflection curve [15,16]) can be obtained, and the
typical load-deflection curve is shown in Fig. 3. The peak axial load in
the load-deflection curve could be regarded as the critical buckling load
(Pcr) of the pile (Fig. 3) [15,16].
3. Validation of the proposed prediction method
The proposed prediction method is subsequently assessed for its ac­
curacy and reliability via the consideration of two case studies. Firstly,
buckling analysis of initially bent columns, comparing the results with
the finite element simulation results reported in Nadeem et al. [15].
Secondly, buckling analysis of piles in liquefied soils, comparing the
present predicting results with the centrifuge test results given by
Bhattacharya [8].
3.1. Compare with the finite element model
Nadeem et al. [15] performed a buckling analysis of initially bent
column using the finite element software ABAQUS. In this finite element
model, an imperfection in the form of a half sine profile bent (Fig. 2b)
along the centroidal axis has been incorporated in the column, and the
initial imperfection amplitude (a) is taken as 0.3 m. The column was
simulated by the linear-elastic perfectly plastic material. The buckling
analysis was carried out using the Riks method.
In the validation analysis, the values of all the parameters are
consistent with the values reported in Nadeem et al. [15]. The slen­
derness ratio of the column is 20, with a length of 40 m and a diameter of
2 m. The node coordinates of the column in the x-coordinate are
Fig. 3. Typical load-deflection curve for buckling analysis (after Nadeem
et al. [15]).
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Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197
calculated using Eq. (4), where the initial imperfection amplitude (a) is
taken as 0.3 m. Moreover, the column was simulated as a linear-elastic
perfectly plastic material, and Young’s modulus of elasticity E ¼ 160
Gpa, Poisson’s ratio νc ¼ 0.3 and yield strength σy ¼ 200 MPa. The
load-deflection curve obtained by the method of this study and Nadeem
the column could be calculated using Eq. (5).
EI
PE ¼ π 2 (5)
Leff 2
where EI is the flexural rigidity of column, and Leff is the effective length
of the column. Then, the critical buckling load predicted by this study is
0.267PE. It is almost the same as the finite element simulation result in
Nadeem et al. [15], which is 0.274PE (Fig. 4).
3.2. Compare with the centrifuge tests
Bhattacharya [8] performed a series of dynamic centrifuge tests to
investigate pile buckling instability in liquefiable soils. It was found that
Pile 8 in Test SB-04 and Pile 10 in Test SB-06 failed in buckling mode
during shaking. The results of these two damaged piles were used to
verify the proposed method. All values described in the paper are pre­
sented in the prototype scale. The soil model consisted of one layer of
saturated Fraction E silica sand with a thickness of 9 m. Properties of the
sand are listed in Table 1.
In the tests, both Pile 8 and Pile 10 are pipe pile made of Aluminum
alloy. A superstructure load of 2180 kN and 1838 kN were applied on the
pile top of Pile 8 and Pile 10, respectively. These two piles were fixed at
the base of the soil box. The detailed pile properties are given in Table 2.
Moreover, a specially designed frame was used to restrain the head mass
against inertial action, in other words, only the effect of the axial load
was considered in these two piles.
For the second validation analysis, two BNWF models were estab­
lished using the above method to calculate the critical buckling load of
Pile 8 and Pile 10. The values of the analysis parameters of the piles are
same as the values in the centrifuge test, which is given in Table 2. A
trilinear relationship was adopted to characterize the recorded moment-
curvature relationships for the pile, as shown in Fig. 5. The pile bottom
was fully fixed to simulate the boundary condition of the end-bearing
pile. Moreover, as the pile is under the combined action of 1 g gravity
acceleration and 50 g centrifugal acceleration during the test, and these
two accelerations are perpendicular to each other. The pile may be
associated with geometric imperfections in the type of quarter sine
profile (Fig. 2a). The initial imperfection amplitude a is taken as 0.5%-,
1%-, and 2%-times the length of pile (L), owing to there is no accurate
test data on the initial imperfection amplitude. The parameters of soil
springs and their determination methods are given in Table 1. The
calculated critical buckling loads based on the proposed method are
Fig. 4. Comparison of the load-deflection curve from this study with finite
element analysis of Nadeem et al. [15].
X. Zhang et al. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197

Table 1 Table 3
Soil properties for the validation analysis. Compare with the centrifuge test results by Bhattacharya [8].
Parameter SB- SB- Description and source [Reference] Pile Axial load, P Critical buckling load, Pcr Predicted Observed
(Unit) 04 06 No. (Experimental) (Computed) by the in the tests
proposed
Dr (%) 43 40 Relative density measured in the test [8] a/l ¼ a/l ¼ a/l
method
Gs 2.65 2.65 Specific gravity of the sand in the test [8,28] 0.5% 1.0% ¼
emin 0.613 0.613 Minimum void ratio of the sand in the test [8, 2.0%
28]
Pile 2180 kN 1446 1109 949 Failure (P Failure
emax 1.014 1.014 Maximum void ratio of the sand in the test [8,
8 kN kN kN > Pcr)
28]
Pile 1838 kN 1417 1086 930 Failure (P Failure
e 0.842 0.854 Void ratio, e ¼ emax-Dr(emax-emin) [29]
10 kN kN kN > Pcr)
ρ (ton/m3) 1.896 1.890 Saturated density, ρ ¼ ρw(Gsþ1)/(1þe), ρw ¼ 1.0
[29]
(N1)60cs 8.5 7.4 Equivalent clean sand SPT blow count, (N1)60cs
¼ 46D2r [30,31] 4. Parametric study
CD 42.5 42.5 The factor depending upon the grain size
properties of soils, CD ¼ 9/(emax-emin)1.7 [21,32] An extensive parametric study was performed to comprehend the
Sr (kPa) 2.54 1.69 Residual shear strength of liquefied soil effect of soil relative density, initial geometric imperfections of pile,
computed using the lower bound value in Seed
and Harder [33]
flexural rigidity of pile, and pier height on the critical buckling load of
Ns 9.2 9.2 Scaling factor for p-y curves, Ns ¼ 9.2 for smooth the end-bearing pile. In this parametric study, the baseline case is Pile 8
soil-pile interface and Ns ¼ 11.94 for rough soil- from the second validation analysis shown above.
pile interface [21,22]

4.1. Effect of soil relative density

Table 2
The effects of soil relative density on the critical buckling load of pile
Pile properties (Bhattacharya [8]).
have been shown in Figs. 6–8. Three different soil relative density, i.e.,
Parameters Pile 8 Pile 10 Dr ¼ 30%, Dr ¼ 40%, and Dr ¼ 50% were used, and the properties of the
Test ID SB-04 SB-06 sand are listed in Table 4. It is found that increasing soil relative density
Material Aluminum alloy Aluminum alloy increases the critical buckling load of pile with an identical length and
Axial load, P (kN) 2180 1838
diameter. In addition, there is a sudden increase in the critical buckling
Pile length (m) 11.13 11.13
Pile outside diameter (mm) 465 465
load of pile for surrounding soil of relative density of 50% as compared
Pile inside diameter (mm) 425 425 to that of 40%. The reason is because the residual shear strength (Sr) of
Young’s modulus, E (MPa) 7.0 � 104 7.0 � 104 soil with a relative density of 50% is more than five times that of soil
Poisson’s ratio 0.33 0.33 with a relative density of 40% (Table 4). This results in that the soil with
a relative density of 50% can substantially offer more lateral resistance
to the pile than the soil with a relative density of 40% [21,34]. The

Fig. 5. Nonlinear moment-curvature relationship of the pile (after Bhatta­

charya [8]).

shown in Table 3. If the axial load of the pile is higher than the critical
buckling load, the pile will fail in buckling instability. Therefore, ac­
cording to the method proposed in this paper, Pile 8 and Pile 10 will fail
in buckling instability, which is consistent with the centrifuge test re­
sults (Table 3).
Since the calculation results of the proposed method are in good
agreement with the finite element results and the centrifuge test results,
it can be concluded that the proposed method can be reliably used to
calculate the critical buckling load of pile in liquefied soils.

Fig. 6. Effect of geometric imperfections on the critical buckling load of pile

under three different sand relative density.

4
X. Zhang et al. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197

Table 4
Soil properties for the parametric analysis.
Parameter Sand Sand Sand Description and source [Reference]
(Unit) 1 2 3

Dr (%) 30 40 50 Relative density [37]

ρ (ton/m3) 1.938 1.957 1.976 Saturated density [37]
ρw (ton/m3) 1.0 1.0 1.0 Fluid density [37]
(N1)60cs 4.14 7.36 11.5 Equivalent clean sand SPT blow
count, (N1)60cs ¼ 46D2r [30,31]
CD 41 41 41 The factor that can be taken as 20 for
sand with fines, 41 for clean sand and
70 for gravelly sand [21,32]
Sr (kPa) 0.42 1.68 8.89 Residual shear strength of liquefied
soil computed using the lower bound
value in Seed and Harder [33]
Ns 9.2 9.2 9.2 Scaling factor for p-y curves, Ns ¼ 9.2
for smooth soil-pile interface and Ns
¼ 11.94 for rough soil-pile interface
[21,22]

larger lateral resistance to the pile, the larger axial load required for pile
fail in buckling instability, therefore leading to, the larger critical
buckling load of pile [8,35]. This finding was also reported by Shields
[36] and Kamash and Naggar [35]. In general, increasing the soil rela­
tive density will increases the buckling resistance of pile.

4.2. Effect of geometric imperfections of pile

A parameter analysis based on the shape of geometric imperfections

Fig. 7. Effect of flexural rigidity on the critical buckling load of pile under three
different sand relative density.
of pile has been performed. Two typical initially bent profiles, i.e.,
quarter sine profile and half sine profile (Fig. 2), were used considering
the geometric imperfections. Five different initial imperfection ampli­
tude (a), i.e., 0.5%-, 1.0%-, 1.5%-, 2.0%-, and 2.5%- times the length of
pile (L). This range of values is considered in the analyses as being
practically possible to occur as reported by Chan and Hanna, 1979 [38]
and Nadeem et al., 2015 [15]. Fig. 6 shows the critical buckling load of
pile for different initial imperfection amplitude. It is observed that the
critical buckling load of pile decreases drastically with increasing initial
imperfection amplitude for both quarter sine and half sine initially bent
profiles. Also, piles with an initial quarter sine bent profile present
higher axial load-carrying capacity (i.e., the critical buckling load of
pile) as compared with that for half sine bent piles for a given initial
imperfection amplitude in all analysis (Figs. 6–8). Overall, the presence
of geometric imperfections in a pile increases the probability of pile
buckling and lowers the buckling load. Therefore, it is important to keep
the imperfection amplitude of pile as small as possible during pile
installation.

4.3. Effect of flexural rigidity of pile

According to the well-known Euler’s buckling formula (Eq. (5)), the

flexural rigidity EI has a significant influence on the critical buckling
load of the column. Therefore, it can be inferred that the flexural rigidity
also has some significant influence on the buckling load of the pile. By
changing the moment of inertia of the pile, five different flexural ri­
gidities (i.e., EI ¼ 25.9, 48.5, 68.2, 85.2, and 99.7 MN-m2) were used for
parameter analysis. Fig. 7 presents the critical buckling load of pile with
different flexural rigidities of pile. In all cases, it can be concluded that
the critical buckling load of pile increases rapidly with the increase of
the flexural rigidity, which is similar to the effect of flexural rigidity on
the critical buckling load of a column on the basis of Euler’s buckling
formula (Eq. (5)). On the other hand, it is well-known that the bending
capacity of pile increases with the increase of flexural rigidity [39], so
this parameter has a significant influence on the bending capacity and
axial load-carrying capacity of pile.
Fig. 8. Effect of pier height on the critical buckling load of pile under three
different sand relative density.

5
X. Zhang et al. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197

4.4. Effect of pier height

The pier height (l) is defined by the length of the pile above the
ground surface (Fig. 1a) [40]. In this section, results obtained from re­
petitive analysis for the pier height of 1 m, 2 m, 3 m, 4 m, and 5 m are
studied. In these cases, the total length of pile (L) is same with the
baseline case, which is 11.13 m. The effect of pier height on the critical
buckling load of pile is shown in Fig. 8. As can be seen, increasing the
pier height decreases the critical buckling load in all cases. This is due to
the higher the pier height, the shorter the length of the pile embedded in
the soil [21,34], therefore the less lateral support to the pile, making the
pile more susceptible to buckling instability [8,35]. For the case of soil
relative density Dr ¼ 50%, the critical buckling load decreases faster as
the pier height increases compared to the cases of Dr ¼ 30% and Dr ¼
40%. This is because the sand with a relative density of 50% can offer
more lateral support to the pile for the unit length than that of Dr ¼ 30%
and Dr ¼ 40% (Table 4) [22,28]. Therefore, for the case of Dr ¼ 50%, as
the pier height increases, the length of pile embedded in the soil de­
creases, and the lateral support to the pile decreases rapidly, which leads
to a rapid decline of the critical buckling load of pile.

5. A simplified estimation method

5.1. Derivation of the calculation formulae for predicting critical buckling

load

Based on the results of the above parametric study, while referencing

to the other results from Bhattacharya et al. [9], Jesmani et al. [41], and
Haldar and Babu [19] et al., it can be concluded that the buckling
characteristics of pile are similar to the slender column. The main dif­
ference between the two is that there will always be confining pressure
around the pile, and it could provide some lateral support to the pile and
increase the buckling load. Therefore, a simplified calculating formula
of the buckling load of pile can be proposed by modifying the Euler’s
buckling formula (see Eq. (5)), which is the formula for calculating the
buckling load of the column.
Fig. 9 presents the critical buckling load of pile with different soil Fig. 9. The relationship between the normalized pile critical buckling load and
relative density, initial imperfection amplitude, and pier height. The the normalized pier height with different initial bent profile: (a) Dr ¼ 30%; (a)
critical buckling load of pile (Pcr) in Fig. 9 is normalized by the Euler Dr ¼ 40%; and (c) Dr ¼ 50%.
buckling load (PE), and the pier height (l) in Fig. 9 is normalized by the
pile length (L). By fitting the relationship between the Pcr/PE and l/L, an
Table 5
upper bound line and a lower bound line are proposed. The upper bound
The formulae for the upper bound fitting curve and lower bound fitting curve.
fitting curve represents a pile with a smaller initial imperfection
amplitude for quarter sine initially bent profile (a/L ¼ 0.5%), which is a Soil relative Upper bound Lower bound
density
widespread situation in practical engineering [15,38]. For example, a
� �
44 m long H-section steel pile has an initial imperfection amplitude of Dr ¼ 30%
Pcr ¼ 0:244 ln
l
þ Pcr ¼ 0:019 ln
l
þ
0.26 m (i.e., a/L ¼ 0.059%), which is measured by Hanna [42] with a L L
� �
Wilson slope indicator. While the lower bound line represents a pile with 0:421 � PE 0:538 � PE
a larger initial imperfection amplitude for half sine initially bent profile
� �
Dr ¼ 40% l l
Pcr ¼ 0:387 ln þ Pcr ¼ 0:036 ln þ
(a/L ¼ 2.5%), which is a relatively rare case in practical engineering [15, L L
� �
38]. Such as a 42.7 m long composite pile has an initial imperfection 0:328 � PE 0:534 � PE
amplitude of 1.34 m (i.e., a/L ¼ 3.1%) as reported in Parsons and Wilson Dr ¼ 50%
�
l
� �
l
Pcr ¼ ln þ 0:012 � PE Pcr ¼ 0:141 ln þ
[43]. The formulae for the upper bound fitting curve and lower bound L
�
L
fitting curve are listed in Table 5, where Pcr is the critical buckling load 0:477 � PE
of pile, PE is the Euler buckling load and can be calculated by Eq. (5), l is
the pier height, and L is the total length of pile.
The centrifuge tests carried out by Bhattacharya [8] (described in simplified calculating method for estimating the critical buckling load of
detail above) were used to verify the validity of the proposed formulae pile in liquefied soil.
(Table 5). The computed critical buckling load of Pile 8 using the upper It is noted that these proposed formulae are only applicable when the
bound fitting curve formula and the lower bound fitting curve formula pile top is free and the pile bottom is fixed, for example, the rock
are 1433 kN and 874 kN, respectively, which are less than the axial load socketed pile. In these formulae, the total length of pile L is the length
of Pile 8 (Table 6). This implies that Pile 8 will fail in buckling insta­ without considering the length of the pile embedded in the rock. The
bility, and this is consistent with the centrifuge test results. Similarly, the application of proposed formulae can refer to the following example.
results predicted by the formulae show that the Pile 10 will also buckle,
which is also consistent with the centrifuge test results (Table 6).
Therefore, these proposed formulae (Table 5) could be used as a

6
X. Zhang et al. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197

Table 6
Validation of the proposed simplified method.
Pile No. (Bhattacharya Axial load, P Pcr,Upper Pcr,Lower Predicted by the proposed simplified Observed in the tests (Bhattacharya
[8]) (Experimental) (Computed) (Computed) method [8])

Pile 8 2180 kN 1433 kN 874 kN Failure (P > Pcr,Upper > Pcr,Lower) Failure
Pile 10 1838 kN 1433 kN 874 kN Failure (P > Pcr,Upper > Pcr,Lower) Failure

5.2. Example application of proposed formulae � � � �

l 9
Pcr ¼ 0:387 ln þ 0:328 � PE ¼ 0:387 ln þ 0:328 � 1:09
L 19
An example of a pile passing through the liquefiable soils is chosen to
demonstrate the applicability of proposed formulae (Fig. 10). The � 106
considered soil profile is near a bridge site in Japan: the Showa bridge. ¼ 0:67 � 106 N
The steel tube pile foundation is used in this example, and the outside
diameter and inside diameter of the pile are 0.609 m and 0.591 m, For the lower bound,
respectively. The Young’s Modulus of pile (E) is 210 GPa. The stepwise �
l
� �
9
�
description is given below to obtain the critical buckling load of pile in Pcr ¼ 0:036 ln þ 0:534 � PE ¼
L
0:036 ln
19
þ 0:534 � 1:09
liquefied soil.
� 106
(1) Step 1: Calculation of the Euler buckling load (PE) using Eq. (5). ¼ 0:61 � 106 N

The above method enables to estimate the critical buckling load of

The value of the moment of inertia of pile (I) is given as follows:
pile for both lower bound and upper bound condition. It is recom­
π � mended that the designers use the upper bound value for more conser­
I¼ 0:6094 0:5914 ¼ 7:63 � 10 4
m4
64 vative designs.
As mentioned before, in these formulae, the total length of pile L is
the length without considering the length of the pile embedded in the 6. Conclusions
rock, i.e., L ¼ l1þl2 ¼ 19 m. Therefore, the effective length of pile (Leff)
according to Bhattacharya et al. [9] is given as follows: This study provides a better insight into the critical buckling load of
pile in liquefied soils. A calculation method of the critical buckling load
Leff ¼ 2 � L ¼ 2 � 19 ¼ 38 m of pile considering the material and geometric nonlinearities of pile, soil
The Euler buckling load (PE) according to Eq. (5) is given as follows: liquefaction, and geometric imperfections of pile is proposed based on
the BNWF model. The validity of this method is confirmed by the
210 � 109 � 7:63 � 10 centrifuge test and the finite element method. Parametric studies are
4
EI
PE ¼ π 2 ¼ 3:142 � ¼ 1:09 � 106 N
carried out for different soil relative density, initial geometric imper­
2
Leff 382
In the example, the soil relative density Dr ~ 40%. The pier height l fections of pile, flexural rigidity of pile, and pier height based on the
¼ l1 ¼ 9 m. The upper bound and lower bound values of critical buckling proposed method. Main conclusions are as follows:
load using the formulae in Table 5 are given as follows:
For the upper bound, (1) An increase in the soil relative density increases the critical
buckling load of pile, which indicates that pile fails more easily in
buckling in saturated loose sand than in medium sand. Moreover,
the shorter the length of the pile embedded in the soil, the smaller
the critical buckling load of pile.
(2) Piles with an initial quarter sine bent profile show a higher axial
load-carrying capacity as compared to that of half sine bent piles
for all the analyses. With the increasing amount of initial
imperfection amplitude, the axial load-carrying capacity of piles
decreases considerably.
(3) Flexural rigidity is a key parameter for the design of pile foun­
dations in liquefiable soils. Increasing the flexural rigidity of pile
will increase the bending capacity and axial load-carrying ca­
pacity of pile.
(4) A simplified estimation method on the critical buckling load of
pile in liquefied soils is suggested based on the Euler’s buckling
formula and verified by the centrifuge test results, and an
example is given to demonstrate the applicability of the proposed
simplified method.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial

interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.

Fig. 10. Schematic diagram of the pile in the example.

(2) Step 2: Calculation of the critical buckling load using the proposed
formulae listed in Table 5.

7
X. Zhang et al. Soil Dynamics and Earthquake Engineering 135 (2020) 106197

CRediT authorship contribution statement [18] Haldar S, Sivakumar Babu GL, Bhattacharya S. Buckling and bending response of
slender piles in liquefiable soils during earthquakes. Geomechanics Geoengin 2008;
3:129–43. https://doi.org/10.1080/17486020802087101.
Xiaoyu Zhang: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Writing [19] Haldar S, Babu GLSLS. Failure mechanisms of pile foundations in liquefiable soil:
- original draft. Liang Tang: Conceptualization, Methodology, Funding parametric study. Int J GeoMech 2010;10:74–84. https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)
acquisition. Xianzhang Ling: Conceptualization, Supervision. Andrew 1532-3641(2010)10:2(74).
[20] Mazzoni S, McKenna F, Scott M, Fenves G. Open system for engineering simulation
Chan: Writing - review & editing, Methodology. user-command-language manual, version 2.0. Pacific Earthquake Engineering
Research Center; 2009.
Acknowledgments [21] Dash S, Rouholamin M, Lombardi D, Bhattacharya S. A practical method for
construction of p-y curves for liquefiable soils. Soil Dynam Earthq Eng 2017;97:
478–81. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soildyn.2017.03.002.
This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China [22] Lombardi D, Dash SR, Bhattacharya S, Ibraim E, Wood DM, Taylor CA.
(Grant No. 2016YFE0205100), the National Natural Science Foundation Construction of simplified design p–y curves for liquefied soils. Geotechnique
2017;67:216–27. https://doi.org/10.1680/jgeot.15.P.116.
of China (Grant Nos. 41902287 and 51578195). [23] Wang S, Orense RP. Modelling of raked pile foundations in liquefiable ground. Soil
Dynam Earthq Eng 2014;64:11–23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.
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