Bearing Capacity Theory

Bearing Capacity

1
Bearing Capacity Failure
 a) General Shear Failure Most
common type of shear failure;
occurs in strong soils and
rocks

 b) Local Shear Failure

Intermediate between general
and punching shear failure

 c) Punching Shear Failure

Occurs in very loose sands
weak clays
2
Bearing Capacity Failure

General shear failure

Local shear failure

Punching shear failure

3
Soil Conditions and Bearing
Capacity Failure

4
Load Displacement
Curves (after Vesicʼ (1973))
a) General Shear Failure
b) Local Shear Failure
c) Punching Shear Failure

5
Comments on Shear Failure
 Usually only necessary to analyze general shear
failure.

 Local and punching shear failure can usually be

anticipated by settlement analysis.

 Failure in shallow foundations is generally

settlement failure; bearing capacity failure must
be analyzed, but in practical terms is usually
secondary to settlement analysis.

6
 Development of Bearing
Capacity Theory
 Application of limit equilibrium methods first done by
Prandtl on the punching of thick masses
of metal.

 Prandtl's methods adapted by Terzaghi to bearing

capacity failure of shallow foundations.

 Vesicʼ and others improved on Terzaghi's original

theory and added other factors for a more complete
analysis

7
Assumptions for Terzaghi's Method

 Depth of foundation is less than or equal to its

width
 No sliding occurs between foundation and soil
(rough foundation)
 Soil beneath foundation is homogeneous semi
infinite mass
 Mohr-Coulomb model for soil
 General shear failure mode is the governing
mode (but not the only mode)
8
Assumptions for Terzaghi's Method

 No soil consolidation occurs

 Foundation is very rigid relative to the soil
 Soil above bottom of foundation has no shear
strength; is only a surcharge load against the
overturning load
 Applied load is compressive and applied
vertically to the centroid of the foundation
 No applied moments present
9
Failure Geometry for Terzaghi's Method

10
Notes on Terzaghi's Method
 Since soil cohesion can be difficult to quantify,
conservative values of c (cohesion) should be used.

 Frictional strength is more reliable and does not

need to be as conservative as cohesion.

 Terzaghi's method is simple and familiar to many

geotechnical engineers; however, it does not take
into account many factors, nor does it consider cases
such as rectangular foundations.

11
The General Bearing Capacity Equation.

12
The General Bearing Capacity Equation.

13
The General Bearing Capacity Equation.

14
Other Factors

15
Other Factors

• For continuous footing,

s=1
• For perpendicular load,
i=1
• For level foundation,
b =1
• For level ground,
g =1
• Need to compute factors
- Bearing Capacity Factor N,
- Depth Factor d

16
Groundwater Effects

17
 Groundwater Effects
Shallow groundwater affects shear strength in two ways:

 Reduces apparent cohesion that takes place when soils

are not saturated; may necessitate reducing the
cohesion measured in the laboratory

 Pore water pressure increases; reduces both effective

stress and shear strength in the soil (same problem as
is experienced with unsupported slopes)

18
Groundwater Effects

19
FOOTINGS WITH ECCENTRIC
OR INCLINED LOADINGS

Eccentricity

Inclination
20
 FOOTINGS WITH One Way Eccentricity
In most instances, foundations are subjected to moments in addition to the
vertical load as shown below. In such cases the distribution of pressure by the
foundation upon the soil is not uniform.

21
22
23
 FOOTINGS WITH One Way Eccentricity

 Note that in these equations, when the eccentricity e

becomes B/6, qmin is zero.
 For e > B/6, qmin will be negative, which means that tension
will develop.
 Because soils can sustain very little tension, there will be a
separation between the footing and the soil under it.
 Also note that the eccentricity tends to decrease the load
bearing capacity of a foundation.
 In such cases, placing foundation column off-center, as
shown in Figure is probably advantageous.
 Doing so in effect, produces a centrally loaded foundation
with a uniformly distributed pressure.

24
FOOTINGS WITH One Way Eccentricity

25
 Footing with Two-way Eccentricities
 Consider a footing subject to a vertical ultimate load Qult and a moment M as
shown in Figures a and b. For this case, the components of the moment M
about the x and y axis are Mx and My respectively. This condition is equivalent
to a load Q placed eccentrically on the footing with x = eB and y = eL as shown
in Figure d.

26
Footing with Two-way Eccentricities

27
Example 1

28
Example 1

29
Example 2

30
Example 2

31
Footings with Inclined Loads

32
 Footings with Inclined Loads
1. Compute the inclination factors using the equations given below:

βͦ inclination of load with respect to vertical

2. Use the inclination factors just computed to compute Hansen

shape factors as

33
Footings with Inclined Loads
3. These are used in the following modifications of the "edited“
Hansen bearing capacity equation:

Use the smaller value of qu\t computed by

either of Equations.

34
The Bearing Capacity of
Multi-Layered Soils

35
The Bearing Capacity of Layered Soils

36
 The Bearing Capacity of Layered Soils
 In layered soil profiles, the unit weight of the soil, the angle of
friction and the cohesion are not constant throughout the depth.
The ultimate surface failure may extend through two or more of the
soil layers.

 Consider the case when the stronger soil is underlain by a weaker

soil. If H, the thickness of the layer of soil below the footing, is
relatively large then the failure surface will be completely located in
the top soil layer, which is the upper limit for the ultimate bearing
capacity.

 If the thickness H is small compared to the foundation width B, a

punching shear failure will occur at the top soil stratum, followed by
a general shear failure in the bottom soil layer.

 If H is relatively deep, then the shear failure will occur only on the
top soil layer.
37
 The Bearing Capacity of Layered Soils

 Meyerhof and Hanna (1978) and Meyerhof(1974)

38
39
40
41
42
43
 The Bearing Capacity of Layered Soils

 Meyerhof and
Hannas
punching shear
coefficient Ks

44
 The Bearing Capacity of Layered Soils

 Variation
of c’a/c’1
with
q2/q1
based on the
theory of
Meyerhof and
Hanna (1978)

45
Example on layered soils

46
Example on layered soils

47
Example on layered soils

48
Ground Factors

49
Base Factor

 For footings with angled foundation bases

 When footing is level, b = 1 50
Rigidity
Factors

51
Bearing Capacity from Field Tests

52
Bearing Capacity from SPT

53
Bearing Capacity from SPT

54
Bearing Capacity from SPT

55
Bearing Capacity using CPT

56
Bearing Capacity for Field
Load Tests PLT

57
Bearing Capacity for Field Load Tests PLT

 For Granular Soils:

 For Cohesive Soils:

58
Correction of Standard penetration number
 It has been suggested that the SPT be standardized to some
energy ratio Er which should be computed as

 Note that larger values of Er decrease the blow count N nearly

linearly, that is, Er45 gives N = 20 and Er90 gives N = 10;

 Example of N for Er45 = 20 we obtain for the arbitrarily chosen

Er = 70, (Er70):

N for Er70 = 13 59