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Numerical Analysis of Shallow Foundations under Combined Horizontal and

Torsional Loading

Conference Paper  in  Geotechnical Special Publication · March 2012

DOI: 10.1061/9780784412121.036

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 Numerical Analysis of Shallow Foundations under Combined Horizontal and
Torsional Loading

H. Nouri1, G. Biscontin2, and C. Aubeny3

1
Zachry Department of Civil Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station,
Texas, USA, 3136 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-3136; PH (979) 402-9049,
FAX (979) 862-7696; Email: nouri1978@tamu.edu; nouri_hr@yahoo.com
2
Zachry Department of Civil Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station,
Texas, USA, 3136 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-3136; PH (979) 845-6303,
FAX (979) 862-7696; Email: gbiscontin@civil.tamu.edu
3
Zachry Department of Civil Engineering, Texas A&M University, College Station,
Texas, USA, 3136 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-3136; PH (979) 845-4478,
FAX (979) 862-7696; Email: caubeny@civil.tamu.edu

ABSTRACT

Foundations of subsea infrastructure in deep water subjected to asymmetric

environmental loads have underscored the importance of combined torsional and
horizontal loading effects on the bearing capacity of rectangular shallow foundations.
The purpose of this study is to investigate the undrained sliding and torsional bearing
capacity of rectangular and square shallow foundations together with the interaction
response under combined loading using three-dimensional finite element (3D-FE)
analysis. Upper bound plastic limit analysis is employed to establish a reference value
for horizontal and torsional bearing capacity, and an interaction relationship for the
combined loading condition. Satisfactory agreement of plastic limit analysis (PLA)
and 3D-FE results for ultimate capacity and interaction curves ensures that simple
PLA solution could be used to evaluate the bearing capacity problem of foundation
under combined sliding and torsion.

INTRODUCTION

Vertical bearing capacity of shallow foundations under moment and

horizontal forces has been the focus of many studies, but the response of the
foundation under torsion and combined sliding-torsion is not well understood. The
increasing applications of shallow foundations for offshore structures also have
underscored the significance of developing better insight on the effect of torsion on
sliding bearing capacity of foundations. In the offshore environment a large number
of structures, such as LNG facilities, protection structures, pipeline end manifolds and
terminations (PLEMs and PLETs), pipeline sleepers, and riser bases, are mainly
supported on shallow foundations. The sliding bearing capacity of these foundations
is dramatically improved by placing short ribs or peripheral (and internal) foundation
skirts. Typically rectangular foundations with lengths from L=2 to 10 m and aspect
ratios (W/L) of 2:1 are used. The embedment (or skirt) depth (d) to length (L) ratios
are up to d/L= 0.5, but more typically 0.05-0.2 (Randolph et al. 2011).
LNG facilities in shallow water are subjected to asymmetric environmental loads.
Furthermore, the main frame of deepwater pipeline terminals and manifolds are under
offset pull-in and thermal loads from the connectors to the structure. As a result, the
foundation is subjected to significant eccentric horizontal in-plane (of the foundation
base) horizontal loads with low eccentric vertical loads (Randolph et al. 2011).
Therefore, understanding the response of shallow embedded foundations subjected to
co-planar horizontal loads (Hx and Hy) and torsion (moment about z axis, Mz or Tz) as
dominant design loads for subsea infrastructure is significant.

Design codes (e.g. DNV, 1992 and API, 2000) have general comments on
considering the effect of fishing gear and overtrawlability in the design, which are the
sources of combined horizontal and torsional loading; however, they do not offer
explicit methods for taking the horizontal loads and torsion into account for
foundation design purposes.

Sparse literature is available on the behavior of shallow foundations under combined

horizontal loads and torsion. Murff and Miller (1977) used upper bound limit analysis
to study the bearing capacity of multi footing offshore structures where they also
studied the effect of torsion on the collapse load of foundation systems.

Using limit equilibrium analysis Finnie and Morgan (2004) showed that the sliding
resistance of the surface foundation could be decreased significantly if combined with
torsional moments. They also developed a normalized interaction equation for square
and rectangular surface foundations subjected to combined sliding and torsion.

Yun et al. (2009) conducted three dimensional finite element (3D-FE) analysis to
more rigorously study the interaction of vertical, horizontal, and torsional loads (V-H-
T) acting on circular, square, and rectangular surface footings. The 3D-FE results of
the ultimate horizontal and torsional bearing capacity overestimated Finnie and
Morgan (2004) limit equilibrium values by 4% and 11 % respectively. They also
developed normalized failure envelopes (H/Hmax-T/Tmax) for square and rectangular
foundations of various aspect ratios.

Murff et al. (2010) developed an upper bound plastic limit analysis (PLA)
formulation for shallow embedded square and rectangular foundations under
combination of co-planar sliding and torsion. They conducted a brief parametric study
on the effect of aspect ratio (W/L=1 and 2) and embedment (d=0 and L/20) and
compared the results for ultimate horizontal and torsional failure loads with Finnie
and Morgan (2004) and Yun et al. (2009) results to validate the PLA formulation. The
results of the PLA solution were in excellent agreement with 3D-FE values for
surface foundation. However, Murff et al. (2010) did not investigate the validity of
PLA results for different embedment depths.

3D-FE analysis for shallow embedded foundations under pure in-plane horizontal
load (H), pure torsion (T), and the combination (H-T) is conducted in the present
study. The PLA solution originally developed by Murff et al. (2010) is validated
through comparing the results with 3D-FE analysis.

NUMERICAL SIMULATION
GEOMETRY AND MATERIAL PARAMETERS

The commercial software ABAQUS (HKS, 2008) is used in this study. Linear elastic
perfectly plastic material, with yielding determined by the von Mises failure criterion
and undrained shear strength, su is used to model the undrained clay soil. Simple
shear is the governing shear failure in foundation under sliding and torsion and a very
small portion of the soil adjacent to the shallow skirts of the foundation is subjected
to quasi-triaxial condition. Gourvenec et al. (2006) also showed that even for
rectangular footing under uniaxial vertical loading a small portion of the soil in the
plastic zone is experiencing quasi-triaxial shearing. Therefore, the constant undrained
simple shear strength of the soil (suSS) is used in the numerical simulation, which is
also consistent with the PLA assumption for computing the dissipation terms.

In the present study the Young’s modulus of soil is given by a modulus ratio of E/su
=500. The ultimate capacity of the foundation is not affected by the pre-failure elastic
behavior of the soil (Chen & Liu 1990). Thus, a parametric study is not performed for
this material constant. Poisson’s ratio is also taken as 0.49 to simulate no volume
change condition for undrained clay in total stress analysis. The foundation is
modeled as a rigid body with Young’s modulus 1010 times that of the soil, and
Poisson’s ratio of 0.10. Soil and foundation surfaces are simulated fully bonded, i.e.
no separation and no tangential sliding are allowed.

FINITE ELEMENT MESH

Figure 1 shows a sample of the 3D mesh and various zones of the model for a
rectangular foundation. As shown in Figure 1, the smaller (L) and longer (W) sides of
the footing are parallel to the x and y axes respectively. The model dimensions are
9L×9L×5L and 9L×12L×5L for the square and rectangular foundations. Three
dimensional 8-node fully integration hybrid elements, C3D8H, are used to simulate
the soil material. Hybrid type elements are used for soil to accommodate the no
change volume constraint in undrained analysis. Both square and rectangular (W/L=2)
shapes are considered for the foundation with two embedment depths of d =L/40, and
L/14. The whole mesh is divided to 6 zones constrained to each other along the
common surfaces. The finest mesh zone extending to 2d around the foundation
embedment consists of two way bias grading of elements across the footing area, as
well as the height of the footing skirt. The thickness of the elements under the footing
is very small, less than 0.01L, to assist the kinematics of sliding and torsion. The bias
grading of elements also provides an adequately fine mesh in the vicinity of the sharp
edges of the rigid foundation. The final FE mesh was obtained after evaluating
various mesh densities, especially for the finest mesh zone, which has the most
impact on the accuracy of the ultimate results, as well as on the computational
expense of the numerical simulation. Standard boundary conditions are applied to the
model: the base is fixed in all directions, while the vertical boundaries are fixed in the
lateral direction and free to move vertically.

The analysis is conducted using displacement control analysis. Since the ultimate
sliding and torsion capacity is developed within footing movement of 0.1 times the
foundation length, the analysis is small strain displacement control. A reference node
is defined in the center base of the footing and prescribed displacements are applied
to the whole rigid foundation through the assigned reference point to perform
displacement controlled analysis.

Figure 1. Example of a 3D finite element mesh for a rectangular plate.

ULTIMATE BEARING CAPACITY

FE results for pure shear and pure torsion loading capacity factors are compared with
Murff et al. (2010) PLA solution in Tables 1 and 2 for square and rectangular (W/L=
2) foundations, respectively. Note that the horizontal in-plane (parallel to footing
base) displacements are applied in the direction parallel to the smaller (L) side of the
foundation (x direction) and torsion is prescribed as the rotation of the footing about
the z axis (Figure 1). The results are shown in normalized form, Nsx,max and Nt,max, as
below:

RFx ,max
N sx ,max = (1)
LWsu
RM z ,max
N t ,max = (2)
L2Wsu

where RFx, is the horizontal capacity reaction in x direction and RMz is the torsional
reaction moment of the foundation about z axis. The normalized load-displacement
and torsion-rotation responses are also depicted in Figures 2 and 3.
Table 1. Comparison of PLA and FE ultimate sliding (Ns,max) and torsion
moment (Nt,max) bearing capacity factors for square foundations
Normalized Finite PLA results: Difference of
Mode of Loading foundation Element Murff et al. FE and PLA
depth (d/L) results (2010) values (%)
0 1.0 1.0 0.00
Sliding
(Ns,max) 1/40 1.196 1.194 0.19
1/14 1.541 1.564 -1.48
0 0.383 0.383 0.00
Torsion,
(Nt,max) 1/40 0.484 0.493 -1.65
1/14 0.669 0.717 -6.74

Table 2. Comparison of PLA and FE ultimate sliding (Nsx,max) and torsion

moment (Nt,max) bearing capacity factors for rectangular foundations

Normalized Finite PLA results: Difference of

Mode of Loading foundation Element Murff et al. FE and PLA
depth (d/L) results (2010) values (%)

0 1.0 1.0 0.00

Sliding in x
direction 1/40 1.175 1.168 0.68
(Nsx,max) 1/14 1.484 1.484 0.01
0 0.593 0.593 0.00
Torsion,
1/40 0.717 0.719 -0.24
(Nt,max)
1/14 0.939 0.968 -3.06

As expected, the ultimate horizontal capacity of the shallow foundation increases for
higher embedment depths. As depicted in Figures 2 and 3, the ultimate bearing
capacity values are developed at normalized foundation displacements of less than
ux/L=0.03 and 0.04 for square and rectangular footings, respectively. As shown in
Tables 1 and 2, the results of the in-plane horizontal collapse loads obtained through
PLA and FE are in very close agreement. FE value for the square foundation with
d=L/14 under-predicts the PLA collapse load by 1.5%, while sliding capacity values
with smaller embedment depth show a difference lower than 0.2%. Therefore, it
seems that the PLA predictions for horizontal bearing capacity are very satisfactory.
 Figure 2. Normalized load-displacement curve for square and rectangular
foundations under sliding

Figure 3. Normalized torsion-rotation response of square and rectangular

foundations under torsion

PLA values of torsion failure moment generally over-predict FE results of ultimate

torsion capacity factors for all the investigated cases. The difference between PLA
predictions and FE values for torsion capacity reduces for smaller embedment depths.
However, FE results for rectangular foundations are closer to PLA values when
compared with the corresponding results for the same embedment depth of a square
footing. The difference between FE and PLA results for Nt,max ranges from 1.7-6.7%
and 0.3-3.0% for square and rectangular footings, respectively. This difference is
attributed to the nature of the PLA solution, which provides the upper bound for the
failure load. Although the accuracy of PLA predictions deteriorates for foundations of
higher embedment depths and lower aspect ratio, the PLA solution seems to provide a
satisfactorily accurate estimate for ultimate torsion failure moment. As shown in
Figure 3, maximum torsional capacity of both square and rectangular foundations
with different embedment depths is mobilized at rotation of approximately 0.02 rad.
SLIDING-TORSION (Ns-Nt) FAILURE ENVELOPES

In order to construct the interaction curve or yield locus, two types of displacement
control methods are used: the swipe test and the probe test.

The swipe test was used by Tan (1990) in centrifuge tests to determine the shape of
failure envelope. In the swipe test the foundation is firstly displaced in the direction
of the degree of freedom (DoF) under examination from zero to ultimate capacity. In
the second step, the displacement is imposed in the second DoF until the full
development of ultimate capacity. Generally the swipe test tracks a load path
marginally inside the actual overall foundation failure envelope (Bransby and
Randolph 1998).

In the probe test or fixed displacement method, a single point on the failure envelope
is identified for every fixed ratio of the prescribed combined displacement. Thus, the
yield locus is created by performing a number of FE analyses with different
displacement ratios. The prescribed fixed displacement ratio gives rise to load paths
beginning from the origin with initial gradient based on elastic stiffness. As the
stresses approach the failure envelope, the gradient diminishes to follow the
interaction curve until it stops where there is no further increase in the forces
developed in each intended DoF (Bransby and Randolph 1998). This method gives an
accurate failure envelope, but requires several tests.

The yield loci for square and rectangular foundations with different embedment
depths subjected to in-plane x translation (parallel to smaller sides) and torsion (Nsx-
Nt) are summarized in Figures 4-7. In these Figures fixed displacement ratio load
paths for the probe test as well as the final failure envelope resulted from probe and
swipe tests are depicted for square and rectangular footings of d=L/40 and L/14. Note
that du/dϕ is the prescribed fixed displacement ratio, defined as the ratio of
foundation displacement increment, to the increment of the footing torsional angle.
The envelope of the probe test results exceeds the sliding-first-torsion-next swipe
envelope by about 4-6% and 3-4% for square and rectangular foundations,
respectively. This difference increases for torsion-first-shear-next swipe tests, because
following mobilization of the torsion failure moment the elements in regions close to
mid points of the footing side are not completely plastic yet as the maximum
displacements occur in the region next to end points of the foundation sides.

Figures 4-7 also compare PLA and probe test FE yield loci for square and rectangular
foundations. PLA predictions for interaction curve over-predict FE envelopes. Similar
to ths evaluation for ultimate torsion failure moment, this difference increases for
foundations of higher embedment depths and lower aspect ratio, showing that the
accuracy of the upper bound solution deteriorates. However, the general agreement of
the interaction curves is very satisfactory, especially for very shallow embedment.
Perfect agreement of PLA and FE failure envelopes for surface foundation (d= 0) was
observed by Murff et al. (2010). FE and PLA results for d=L/40 in Figures 4(b) and
5(b) in the present study are also very close.
 (a) (b)
Figure 4. Yield loci for a square foundation of d =L/40 under sliding and torsion (a) FE, swipe
and probe failure envelopes (b) FE (probe) and PLA envelopes

(a) (b)
Figure 5. Yield loci for a rectangular (W/L=2) foundation of d =L/40 under sliding and torsion
(a) FE, swipe and probe failure envelopes (b) FE (probe) and PLA envelopes
Interaction factors for the normalized sliding-torsion envelope (Nsx/Nsx,max-Nt/Nt,max)
are summarized in Table 3. Note that the interaction equation for shear-torsion is:
n k
 Ns   Nt 
f (N
= s , Nt )   +  =  − 1 0 (3)
 N s ,max   N t ,max 

FE failure envelopes indicate that the sliding resistance of the shallow foundation
significantly reduces due to torsion. Interaction of horizontal failure load and torsion
collapse moment for the rectangular foundation under x-sliding-torsion (Nsx/Nsx,max-
Nt/Nt,max) is more than for the square footing. This means that the foundation capacity
for sliding parallel to the larger sides of the rectangular footing is less affected by
torsion. Comparison of the interaction factors in Table (3) also shows that failure
envelopes are very closely spaced, especially for rectangular foundations. Therefore,
foundation embedment does not have considerable effect on sliding-torsion
 interaction of a rough surface foundation; however, it dramatically impacts the
ultimate sliding (Ns,max) and torsion (Nt,max) bearing.

CONCLUSION

This study aims at evaluating the bearing capacity of square and rectangular shallow
embedded foundations subjected to pure sliding and torsion, as well as investigating
their interaction response under combined horizontal and torsional load. 3D-FE
simulations are performed to validate the available plastic limit upper bound analysis
developed by Murff et al. (2010). Although the accuracy of the PLA analysis
deteriorates for higher embedment depths, general agreement of FE and PLA results
is satisfactory. As the PLA solutions are easier to use compared with 3D numerical
simulations, the PLA solution could be used to evaluate the undrained response of
foundations under combined sliding-torsion.

(a) (b)
Figure 6. Yield loci for square foundation of d =L/14 under sliding and torsion (a) FE, swipe
and probe failure envelopes (b) FE (probe) and PLA envelopes

(a) (b)
Figure 7. Yield loci for rectangular (W/L=2) foundation of d =L/14 under sliding and torsion (a)
FE, swipe and probe failure envelopes (b) FE (probe) and PLA envelopes
 Table 3. Interaction factors for sliding-torsion FE failure envelope

Normalized Finite Element results

Foundation
foundation (Nsx/Nsx,max)n+(Nt/Nt,max)k-1=0
aspect ratio (W/L)
depth (d/L)
n k
1/40 1.80 1.76
1
1/14 1.97 1.64
1/40 1.86 1.32
2
1/14 1.89 1.30

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