Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Burj Khalifa Foundation
Burj Khalifa Foundation
Burj Khalifa Foundation
MAIDA AMJAD
1006053
KUMAIL MURAD
1006475
ABSTRACT
This research paper would describe the foundation design process of
the worlds tallest building which is the Burj Khalifa. The foundation is a
piled raft which is founded on deep deposits of carbonate rocks and
soil. The paper will outline the various geotechnical investigations that
were taken into consideration and also the field and laboratory testing
programs and the design process that was carried. This paper would
address the various design issues that were faced during its
construction phase and how they were handled. The numerical
computer analysis that was adopted for the original design together
with the check/calibration analyses will be outlined. The paper sets out
how the various design issues were addressed, including ultimate
capacity, overall stability under wind and seismic loadings, and the
settlement and differential settlements.
INTRODUCTION
The Burj Dubai project is a 162 storey high rise tower, with a podium
development around the base of the tower, including a 4-6 storey
garage. Currently, the Burj Dubai Tower is the worlds tallest building.
The client for the project is Emaar, a leading developer based in Dubai.
It is founded on a 3.7m thick raft supported on bored piles, 1.5 m in
diameter, extending approximately 50m below the base of the raft. The
site is generally level and site levels are related to Dubai Municipality
Datum (DMD).
Key Parties:
in
the
naturally
cemented
calcisiltite/
conglomeritic
calcisiltite
GEOLOGY
The geology of the Arabian Gulf area has been substantially influenced
by the deposition of marine sediments resulting from a number of
changes in sea level during relatively recent geological time. The
country is generally relatively low-lying (with the exception of the
mountainous regions in the northeast of the country), with near-surface
geology dominated by deposits of Quaternary to late Pleistocene age,
including mobile Aeolian dune sands, evaporite deposits and marine
sands.Dubai is situated towards the eastern edge of the geologically
stable Arabian Plate and separated from the unstable Iranian Fold Belt
to the north by the Arabian Gulf. The site is therefore considered to be
located within a seismically active area.
concrete,
incorporating
viscosity-modifying
Laboratory Testing:
The geotechnical laboratory testing program consisted of two broad
classes of test:
1. Conventional tests, including moisture content, Atterberg limits,
particle size distribution, specific gravity, unconfined compressive
strength, point load index, direct shear tests, and carbonate content
tests.
2. Sophisticated tests, including stress path triaxial, resonant column,
cyclic undrained triaxial, cyclic simple shear and constant normal
stiffness (CNS) direct shear tests. These tests were undertaken by a
variety of commercial, research and university laboratories in the UK,
Denmark and Australia.
GEOTECHNICAL CONDITIONS
very
weakly
sandstone/siltstone
cemented
and
sand,
weak
gypsiferous
to
fine
grained
moderately
weak
were
developed
on
other
softwares
such
as
REPUTE
Strata:
Modeled
as
Von
Mises
material
(pressure
FOUNDATION DESIGN
An initial assessment of the pile capacity was carried out using the
following design recommendations given by Horvath and Kenney
(1979), as presented by Burland and Mitchell (1989):
0.5
The assessed pile capacities were provided to SOM and they then
supplied details on the layout, number and diameter of the piles. The
following were the details of the foundation that were generated by
SOM:
Tower piles were 1.5m diameter and 47.45m long with the tower
The initial load settlements were calculated from models that were
analyzed on various softwares. The results are summarized below.
These analyses were carried by Hyder group which were the consultant
of the project.
Table 2. Computed Settlements from Analyses
The maximum and minimum pile loadings were obtained from the FE
analysis for all loading combinations. The maximum loads were at the
corners of the three wings and were of the order of 35 MN, while the
minimum loads were within the center of the group and were of the
order of 12-13 MN. Figure 2 shows contours of the computed maximum
axial load.
72.9mm
PIGS analysis, modeling all 196 piles: 74.3mm