High Strain Dynamic Pile Testing

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Geo Dynamics is a market leader in this testing and owns sets of Pile Driving Analyzers for assessment of
bored / driven concrete and steel piles. We have proven experience of more than a decade in almost all
types of pile foundations listed below

Cast-in-place bored piles for diameters from 400mm to 1600mm
Monitoring of driven pre-cast / pre-stressed concrete piles
Testing of Steel H-pile and close / open ended steel pipe piles
Driven and Bored Micro Piles
Offshore piles for jetties, ports, platforms

We have done co-relation / reliability studies for almost all these pile types installed in different soil
types and using a variety of drop / diesel / hydraulic hammers. Our current data base includes such
studies for more than 100 piles and can be obtained on request.


HSDPT APPLICATIONS
Dynamic pile testing has been in use in more than 40 countries and is a part of various code
specifications worldwide including ASTM 4945. The test can be used to evaluate various pile parameters,
few of those important for cast-in-place bored piles are mentioned below.

Static capacity of the pile at the time of testing.
Static load test curve
Total skin friction and end bearing of the pile
Estimate of skin friction variation along the length of the pile
Compressive and tensile stresses developed in the pile during testing
Net and total displacement of the pile.
Pile integrity and changes in cross-section if any.

In addition to above PDA is an extremely efficient tool for driven piles to decide termination criterion,
hammer, drop height, efficiency, stresses and other parameters.

APPLICABLE FOR
Applicable for practically all types of pile foundations includes cast-in-place driven and cast-in-place
bored concrete piles, driven pre-cast, pre-stressed spun piles, steel H-piles, pipe piles, micro bored and
driven micro piles.

Cannot be used for testing of pile groups and needs a heavy impact to generate forces and velocities and
a Pile Driving Analyzer with sensors to measure them.

PRINCIPLE OF TESTING

The basic purpose of high strain dynamic pile testing is to evaluate pile static capacity and its structural
integrity using measurement of both force and velocity. Unless, any method uses instrumentation to
measure force (or strain) it cannot be called dynamic testing as such, since the basic requirement of the
test is to measure dynamic impact and convert it to static capacity.

The method involves attaching a minimum of two pairs of strain transducers and accelerometers on
diagonally opposite sides of the pile. These are fixed minimum 1.5 times the pile diameter below pile
top & impact generated using a hammer weight equal to 1% to 2% of static test load. Note that it is
required that High Strain Dynamic Testing (HSDPT) confirms to ASTM D4945 or other such relevant
codes.

Strains induced under the impact of a heavy falling hammer from a pre-determined height are measured
with the help of strain transducers attached to the pile, whereas accelerometers record the
accelerations generated in the pile. The Pile Driving Analyzer converts strain to force, and acceleration
records are converted to velocities. The resistance developed by the pile is then a function of force and
velocity and includes few assumed factors such as the quake and damping parameters as inputs based
on the soil type. The maximum pile top compression is obtained by integrating the pile top velocity. A
more accurate value of these parameters is then obtained from CAPWAP analysis conducted on field
data.

BENEFITS OF DYNAMIC PILE TESTING

BORED PILES

Significantly faster and economical than static tests; with proper setup arrangements can test atleast
2 bored piles and even more driven piles per day.
Very effective for large diameter bored piles with huge capacity & applicable for both offshore &
onshore piling
Applicable to almost all kinds of piles.
Reduces or eliminates static load testing especially in case of jetties, flyovers, bridges, multistory
buildings where space is a constraint.
Provides information on friction, end-bearing, pile integrity, hammer performance and plot simulated
load test curve for comparison with static testing.
Reduces controversies and eliminates risk enabling a safe foundation.


DRIVEN PILES

Can be used to decide termination criterion, hammer performance, pile capacity many times
instantaneously at site.
If problem then it can evaluate whether problem is pile / soil / hammer.
Measures driving stresses for effective driving control.
Very effective for offshore piles, where conducting static load testing is very difficult.

http://www.geodynamics.net/?q=high-strain-dynamic-pile-testing
http://www.nbmcw.com/articles/roads/534-retrofitting-techniques-for-bridges-and-flyovers.html