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Civil Constructions: A Lecture Delivered To The 3d Year Students
Civil Constructions: A Lecture Delivered To The 3d Year Students
ef
ad
For masonry with reinforced concrete
buildings the settlements are limited to 15
cm and for wall panel or load bearing
masonry structures to 8 cm.
The depth of the foundation
The minimum distance from the ground surface to the
bottom of the foundation base is the foundation depth
(D
f
) and its value is adopted considering the following
aspects:
a) Performance requirements of building. The
technological destination of the building or the presence
of an underground floor may impose a certain foundation
depth. When the building has an underground floor, this
will determine the foundation depth, which must be at
least 40 cm under the concrete underground floor slab.
b) Presence of another foundation. If a new foundation
is placed near an existing one, it must have the same
depth, with the old one, in order to avoid the stability
perturbation.
c) The minimal frost depth (Hi). Where the water
table is high, soils such as silts, chalk, fine gritty sands
and some lean clays, may expand near the surface when
frozen. This expansion is due to crystals of ice forming
and expanding in the soil and so causing frost heave. So
it is important to know, at the site, the depth where
the seasonal frost and thaw will modify the foundation
ground properties ( bearing capacity). This depth
depends on the climatic zone of the site. In our country
Hi(60115) cm and the foundation foot must exceed
this depth in good ground at least by 1020 cm.
d) Geological-engineering characteristics of the soil,
like physical and mechanical properties, determine also
the foundation depth. The foundation foot must
penetrate more than 20 cm in firm soil in order to avoid
the heave of the surrounding soil.
e) The level of the underground water surface is
important. Generally it is better when the foundation
bottom it is higher than the water table because is
difficult to and expensive to work under water. If the
underground water level is near the ground surface,
underground buildings are not recommendable.
f) The minimum foundation depth (H) - For external
walls (or cold internal walls) it must have
He(Hi...Hi+20) cm but not less than 80...90 cm for
definitive buildings and 60...70 cm for temporary
buildings.
For internal walls in warm regions H must be around
40...50 cm. When the building has underground floor
the foundation must be 40 cm under the floor slab.
PRINCIPLES CONCERNING FOUNDATIONS
CONSTRUCTION AND DESIGN
The materials used for foundations are:
plane concrete (B 25) blinding concrete (equalising
layer), C 2,8/3,5 (B 50) for the foundations in dry soils
without risk of high dampness, C6/7,5 (B 100) for
foundations under with more than two floors placed in
soils with high humidity variations.
Reinforced concrete C 8/10 (B 150) for elastic strip
foundations, foundations on cross beams, raft
foundations, wall beams, C 12/15 (B 200) for
foundations submitted to heavy or to dynamic loads.
Direct foundations
1. Strip foundations
Strip or continuous
foundations consist of a
continuous strip, under load
bearing walls and sometimes
rows of columns if the
distance between them is
not large.
The continuous strip serves
as a level base on which the
wall is built. Its width is
imposed by the necessity to
spread the load of the
foundation to an area of
subsoil capable to support
the load without undue
settlements.
Considering the materials used, this type of foundation can
be made of:
Masonry of natural stones.
Brick foundation made from masonry of high quality
bricks used essentially in aggressive acid subsoil. The
brick foundation is built in steps.
No fines concrete is obtained by inclusion of 30% of
natural stones in concrete in order to reduce the Portland
cement consumption.
Plain concrete, of class C 2,8/3,5,... C6/7,5 represents
the material widely used today for foundation as it can
readily be placed, spread and levelled in foundation
trenches.
Reinforced concrete class C6/7,5 ... C12/15 is used
generally for elastic foundation under framed structure.
1.1 Rigid strip foundations
Rigid wall footings are submitted practically to compression
stresses under the effect of structural load accumulation.
These are massive foundations (narrow and high) and they
have no bending deformations in cross sections.
Usually they are made of plain concrete or no fines
concrete and sometimes of brick and the thickness of the
strip must exceed 40 cm.
In order to be rigid, assuming that whole the cross
section works only in compression, the following condition
must be satisfied:
tg o
ef
> tg o
min
where : tg o
ef
=H/l - the tangent of effective rigid angle;
tg o
min
=1.102.00 - minimal value for rigid angle condition
(depends on the pressure under the foundation foot and
the material used in foundation).
This type of foundation is indicated where the bearing
capacity of the subsoil and the load on the foundation
require the strip to be no wider or a little wider than the
thickness of the wall. Therefore, if the loads are not too
great this foundation can be adapted because it is
cheaper to fill the trenches with plain concrete.
Continuous rigid foundation design
elements
Made of plain concrete, wall footings are the
most widely used in building practice for
individual dwelling houses, buildings with low
height, farms etc., because the loads are small
and it is usual to assume a uniform spread of
loads along walls. A calculation of the load on a
meter run (length) of wall may be taken to select
the width (B) of foundation for the whole wall.
a) Estimation of contact
pressure
The distribution of contact
pressure on the soil under
foundation foot is assumed to
be uniform or following a linear
function of distribution as the
resultant force of compression
representing the accumulation
of the structure loads is acting
centrally or eccentrically.
i) For equally developed foundation (presumed
to be submitted to centric compression):
p
ef
=(N+G
f
)/A
f
=(N+G
f
)/(100xB)sp
alt
with: p
ef
: the actual pressure;
p
alt
=(ap
pl
; m
c
p
cr;
; bp
conv
) : the design bearing capacity of
the soil.
Where the fixed weight of foundation itself ( Gf ) is
considered in the design practice as 10...15 % from the total
weight which bears on it ( N ).
Results :
alt
f
min
p
G N
B
+
=
ii) For eccentric compression (met in the case of a
foundation unequally developed around the symmetry
axis of the structural wall):
with : P - the resultant force of accumulation from all the
structural loads, e
o
- the eccentricity of the resultant force
(P) on the cross section vertical axis of symmetry
P = N+G
f
; e
o
=(Nxe)/(N+G
f
)=M/P
alt
p 1 = p
B
e 6
B 100
P
2
B
0
e
100
P 6
B 100
P
W
M
A
p
f
2 1,
s |
.
|
\
|
= =
f
According to the value of e
o
there are two situations:
1) When the force P is applied in the middle third of the strip
breadth (e
o
B/6) of the foundation only compression stresses
will emerge, all the whole section will be active and p
1
(max)
=p
alt
,
|p
2
|>0.
2) If the force P, is applied outside the middle third of the
cross section (e
o
B/6) of the foundation there will be also
tensile stresses and just a part of the foundation section area
will be active (the compressed part) with B=3C.
b) Rigidity angle condition - (on cross section):
tgo > tgo
min
= f(Rb; pn)
will give the height (H) of the foundation for a
given (B).
The values of tangent depends on the
admissible pressure under the foundation foot
and on the concrete class used for the
foundation.