Storage Tank on Embankment 3-1

Storage Tank on Embankment

This tutorial will demonstrate the use of staging, time-dependent
consolidation and multiple materials in Settle3D. The model represents a
storage tank that is built on layered soil and filled with water.

The model will consist of a total of thirteen stages that will represent
varying loading as the storage tank is filled or emptied.

The finished product of this tutorial can be found in the file Tutorial 03
Storage Tank.s3z in the Examples > Tutorials folder in the Settle3D
installation folder.

Topics covered

• Load staging

• Embankments

• Multiple materials

• Time-dependent consolidation analysis

• Immediate and consolidation settlement

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Defining the Model

If you have not already done so, run Settle3D by double-clicking on the
Settle3D icon in your installation folder. Or from the Start menu, select
Programs → Rocscience → Settle3D 2.0 → Settle3D.

Note that when the Settle3D program is started, a new blank document is
already opened, allowing you to begin creating a model immediately.

Project Settings
Open the Project Settings dialog from the toolbar or the Analysis
menu and make sure the General tab is selected. Define the Stress units
= Metric, stress as kPa. Set the Settlement units = Meters. Select the
Time-dependent consolidation analysis checkbox. Set the Time Units =
Days, and the Permeability Units = meters / day.

A message will appear informing you that the groundwater analysis

option will be turned on because it is required for consolidation analysis.
Click OK.

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Click on the Stages tab and set the Number of Stages = 13. Fill in the
stage times as shown:

# Time (days) Name

1 0 Stage 1
2 30 Stage 2
3 150 Stage 3
4 180 Stage 4
5 280 Stage 5
6 460 Stage 6
7 690 Stage 7
8 790 Stage 8
9 850 Stage 9
10 990 Stage 10
11 1070 Stage 11
12 1110 Stage 12
13 1530 Stage 13

Click on the Groundwater tab and set the Depth to water table = 2
meters. Leave the Water Unit Weight = 9.81. The Depth to the water
table can also vary by stage, but we will not consider this in this tutorial.

Click on the Project Summary tab and enter “Storage Tank Tutorial” as
the project title. Click OK to exit the dialog.

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Adding the Embankment

To add the embankment, select Add Embankment from the toolbar or
the Loads menu.

In the Embankment Designer dialog, enter Base Width = 200 m and both
the Near End Angle and Far End Angle = 8 degrees. Now change both the
Left Angle and Right Angle to 8 degrees. Change the Height to 7 m.
Leave all other parameters with the default values.

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Click OK. You will see crosshairs and will be prompted to pick the near
point of the embankment centerline. You can use the mouse to click on
the Plan View or manually enter the coordinates. Enter 0 -125 then press
enter. Now enter 0 125 and press enter. You should now see the
embankment both in the Plan View (left) and in the 3D View (right). If
the embankment is not visible in the Plan View, click in the Plan View
and select Zoom All or press the F2 function key.

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Adding the Load

The storage tank will be modeled by a circular load. From the Loads
menu, choose Add Circular Load. Change the circle radius to 32.5 m
and the load magnitude to 230 kPa. Since the loading will be changing
with each stage, check the Advanced staging box and enter the data given
in the table below. In the last column, Depth, enter -7 for all stages. Click
OK.

Stage # Load
Factor
1 0.109
2 0.174
3 0.304
4 0.391
5 0.413
6 0.435
7 0.652
8 0.770
9 0.870
10 0.943
11 0.962
12 1
13 1

You will now see a circle that needs to be placed somewhere on the Plan
View. You can click the mouse to place the circular load, or alternatively
you can enter the coordinates in the prompt line at the bottom right of
the screen.

Enter 0 0 and hit Enter to place the centre of the circular load at the
coordinates (0,0) in the Plan View.

You should now see the embankment and the circular load in both the
Plan View (left) and 3D View (right). Look through the various stages by
selecting the tabs at the bottom of the screen. The circular load should be
changing as you go through the various stages.

NOTE: the Depth = -7 for the circular load, effectively places the load on
top of the embankment. Remember that depth is positive downwards in
Settle3D, therefore a negative depth is actually above the ground surface.

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Soil Layers
The 3D view shows a soil layer with a default thickness of 20 m. It is
assumed that rigid bedrock lies below the soil. In this section we will
learn how to change the soil properties and layer geometry.

Soil Properties

Select Soil Properties from the Properties menu. For each of the first
three materials, turn on Immediate Settlement and change the primary
consolidation Material Type to Linear. Enter data for the first three soil
types as shown.

Es Esur Cv
Name
(kPa) (kPa) (m2/day)

Soil Property
Sand fill 25000 25000 0.25
1

Soil Property
Silty sand 20000 20000 0.25
2

Soil Property Dense silty

25000 25000 2.0
3 sand

Leave all other properties at their default values. The dialog for Soil
Property 3 should look like this:

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Change the name of Soil Property 4 to Silty Clay. Turn on immediate

settlement and set Es and Esur to 9000 kPa. Ensure the Material Type is
Non-Linear. Change the Cc to 0.38, the Cr to 0.01, and OCR to 0.7 and
the Initial Void Ratio to 1.1. Change the Cv and Cvr to 0.05 (m2/day).
Leave all other parameters at their default values. Click OK to exit the
dialog.

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Layer Thickness

To define the thickness of the soil layers select Soil Layers from the
Properties menu. Here you can add layers of different material and
change their thickness.

Click the Insert Layer Below button three times, to create a total of
four layers. By default, the material types are assigned in the same order
as they are defined in the Soil Properties dialog. We will use the default
assignments. You can change material assignments by clicking on the
Name and selecting a material type for the layer.

Define the thickness and drainage conditions for each layer as shown
below.

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Check the Drained at Bottom checkbox for the Silty Clay and for the
Dense Silty Sand. Click OK to close the dialog. The model should appear
as follows.

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Field Point Grid

Select Auto Field Point Grid from the toolbar or the Grid menu. Enter
number of grid points = 500, expansion factor = 1.2. Select OK

A grid will be generated and stress and settlement will be automatically

computed throughout the 3-dimensional volume. This will take a little
time, depending on the speed of your computer. By default, contours of
Total Settlement will be shown. Select the final (Stage 13) tab and you
should see the following results.

TIP: if you wish to view the location of the field points, go to View →
Query Display Options and under Field Point Grid, choose a symbol
other than None.

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Results Visualization

Total Settlement
You should be looking at contours of total settlement in the Plan View
and the 3D View. Under the Contour Legend in the Sidebar you can see
that the maximum settlement is 4.17 m. You can visualize this
displacement in the 3D View by clicking on View Controls in the Sidebar
and turning on the checkbox beside Deformed Contours. Rotate the 3D
View (hold down the left mouse button and move the mouse) so that you
can view the deformed settlement as shown below.

TIP: the deformation of the surface is exaggerated. The scale factor can
be changed in the Query Display Options dialog (View > Query Display
Options > Field Point Grid > 3D View).

By default, the settlement at the ground surface (depth = 0) is shown.

You can examine the settlement at different depths by using the depth
control in the Sidebar. The Settlement at a depth of 15 m looks like this:

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TIP: you can change the contour range, interval and color scheme by
choosing Contour Options from the toolbar or the View menu.

Plotting Other Data Types

On the toolbar at the top, you can change the data type being plotted. As
well as Total Settlement you can select Immediate Settlement or
Consolidation Settlement. The Total Settlement is the sum of the
Immediate Settlement and Consolidation Settlement. Therefore plotting
either one of these will show less displacement than the Total Settlement.
In this case, the maximum immediate settlement is 1.4 m and the
maximum consolidation settlement is 2.78 m.

You can also plot the Loading Stress or Total Stress. The Loading stress
is simply the stress due to the load, whereas the Total Stress is the
Loading Stress plus the stress due to gravity (i.e. self-weight of the soil).

Queries
To obtain results at specific locations, you can add Query Points or Query
Lines. These allow you to graphically plot data versus depth, horizontal
distance, or time at any location in the model.

Query Points

From the Query menu, select Add Query Point. You will see the Query
Point dialog as shown.

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Leave the default choice of Automatic. This will generate subdivisions

such that the discretization is denser near the ground surface and at
layer boundaries, where the high stress gradients are likely to be.

Click OK and the cursor will become a cross-hairs in the Plan View. You
now need to specify the location of the Query Point on the surface. Click
on the point at the centre of the circular load.

Change the plot type back to Total Settlement, turn off the deformed
contours and set the viewing depth back to 0 m. Rotate the model so that
you can view the point query results in the 3D View as shown below.

The Total Settlement is plotted along the vertical line represented by the
query point. To graph this data, select Graph Query from toolbar or the
Query menu. Select the Query Point using the mouse and hit Enter.

TIP: a shortcut to graph query data is to right-click on the Query Point in

the Plan View, and select Graph Query from the popup menu.

In the Plot Query Points dialog, choose Data vs. Stage Time for the Plot
Type, and choose Total Settlement if it is not already selected.

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Select OK and you should see the following graph of Time versus Total
Settlement at depth = 0.

As expected the amount of settlement increases with time as more load is

applied, and the clay layer consolidates further. Note that the apparent
“steps” in the Total Settlement are due to the computation of Immediate
Settlement, followed by Consolidation Settlement, at each stage. You can
verify this by plotting Immediate and Consolidation settlement by
changing the data type in the toolbar drop-list. Notice the step-wise
nature of the Immediate Settlement plot.

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Query Lines

Toggle back to the model view by clicking the Plan / 3D View tab at the
bottom left of the screen. Select Add Query Line from the toolbar or the
Query menu. You are first prompted for the number of horizontal
divisions. Leave the default value of 20. As with a Query Point, you are
also prompted for the number of vertical divisions. This time select
Evenly Spaced Divisions and change the number to 30.

This will generate 20 vertical strings with 30 divisions in each string.

Click OK and you will now be prompted for the start point of the line.
With the mouse, select the existing query point at the centre of the circle.
You will now be prompted to enter the second point. Using the keyboard,
enter the coordinates 150 0. Hit Enter.

The Query line will appear on the Plan View with bars giving the Total
Settlement along the line. The minimum and maximum values are shown
numerically. The 3D View will show a vertical cross-section with contours
of Total Settlement. To see this clearly, turn off the Point Query by
clearing the checkbox next to Point Queries on the Sidebar (under View
Controls). Your screen should now look like this:

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You can now plot the data by selecting Query → Graph Query and
selecting the line (or by right-clicking on the line and choosing Graph
Query). Choose what you wish to plot (Total Settlement), select all the
stages and click OK. You will now see a graph showing the Total
Settlement versus horizontal distance along the line at all 13 stages:

This is the Total Settlement along a line at the ground surface. You can
change the depth of the line by using the depth control in the Sidebar.
You can also change the data being plotted using the pull-down menu at
the top. The plot below shows the consolidation settlement along the
query line, at a depth of 15 m.

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TIP: you can export this data to a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet by simply
right-clicking on the graph and choosing Chart in Excel. If you prefer
another spreadsheet program, then choose Copy Data to Clipboard and
you will be able to paste it into any Windows program.

This concludes the Storage Tank tutorial; you may now exit the Settle3D
program.

Settle3D v.2.0 Tutorial Manual