SOIL-SHEET PILE INTERACTION - PART II: NUMERICAL ANALYSIS AND SIMULATION

This study investigates the interaction between soil and the embedded sheet pile wall at the interface which is not generally well captured in the conventional theoretical and design methods. This was implemented by carrying out numerical analysis to study the behavior and response of the two contacting materials using incremental loading technique. The effects of the interaction were investigated in terms of deformations and stress distributions, all based on Finite Element technique. Numerical analyses of sheet pile wall embedded in homogenous and heterogeneous soil strata were performedindependently. The results showed variation between the theoretical conventional design approach and that of the numerical analysis for both anchored and cantilevered sheet pile walls. The numerical analysis showed various cases of overestimation of deformation in assumed homogenous sand by 31.28% compared to the ideal heterogeneous soil layers, with strong indication of the positive contributions of cohesion values in soils generally assumed as cohessionless. Additional study on the possible replacement of embedded conventional steel rebar with Carbon Fibre Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) in concrete sheet pile along corrosive shoreline environment was undertaken. The general response of the CFRP reinforced pile in relation to conventional steel showed no significant variation in terms of horizontal deformation.