Although the The standard of practice ranges from services offered by reputable
companies with considerable expertise and experience to companies that do
not appreciate the risks and economic implications that arise from poor or inaccurate ground evaluation. In an area where expertise is of ultimate importance, codes of practice are intended to provide guidance on the practical aspects of the field work. Codes and recommendations should be viewed as the sum of experience and consensus of opinion of a group of experts with respect to techniques and procedures in a given subject. These design of a site investigation programme should ideally be carried out by a soil mechanics specialist, this is not always the case in practice. The standard of practice ranges from services offered by reputable companies with considerable expertise and experience to companies that do not appreciate the risks and economic implications that arise from poor or inaccurate ground evaluation. In an area where expertise is of ultimate importance, codes of practice are intended to provide guidance on the prac The standard of practice ranges from services offered by reputable companies with considerable expertise and experience to companies that do not appreciate the risks and economic implications that arise from poor or inaccurate g The standard of practice ranges from services offered by reputable companies with considerable expertise and experience to companies that do not appreciate the risks and economic implications that arise from poor or inaccurate ground evaluation. In an area where expertise is of ultimate importance, codes of practice are intended to provide guidance on the practical aspects of the field work. Codes and recommendations should be viewed as the sum of experience and consensus of opinion of a group of experts with respect to techniques and procedures in a given subject. These round evaluation. In an area where expertise is of ultimate importance, codes of practice are intended to provide guidance on the practical aspects of the field work. Codes and recommendations should be viewed as the sum of experience and consensus of opinion of a group of experts with respect to techniques and procedures in a given subject. These tical aspects of the field work. Codes and recommendations should be viewed as the sum of experience and consensus of opinion of a group of experts with respect to techniques and procedures in a given subject. These recommendations help in defining the content and number of tests necessary to establish the compatibility of Figure 1.8 Mini-crawler (courtesy of A.P. van den Berg).Introduction 11 the site with the proposed construction, bearing in mind that expenditure generally increases with larger projects and more difficult site conditions. Engineers are always struggling with the balance between efficiency and economy. This balance, recognized early on by Peck (1969), is now incorporated into codes of practice such as the Eurocode. Peck stated that investigation methods form three broad groups