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Compensated Raft Foundation on a Preloaded Soil Improved by Vertical Drains

Conference Paper  in  Geotechnical Special Publication · May 2014

DOI: 10.1061/9780784413401.051

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Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 515

Compensated Raft Foundation on a Preloaded Soil

Improved by Vertical Drains

Arindam Dey1 and Mamidi Anvesh Reddy2

1
Assistant Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati,
Assam – 781039, India; arindam.dey@iitg.ac.in
2
Business Analyst, Mu-Sigma, Bangalore, Karnataka – 560066, India; anveshnsk@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: Compensated raft foundation is used to support heavily loaded

structures resting on soft and low-permeable soils, and aids in the reduction in
settlement due to lowering of the stress transferred to the underlying soil. Such soils
often require preloading and pre-treating with vertical drains to arrest the majority of
the final settlement under the actual construction in lesser time. This paper reports the
attainable efficacy in adopting the above methods for the foundation of the 10th Boy’s
Hostel at the Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati. Soft clayey and marshy fill
soil is prevalent in the hostel site. FEM modelling using PLAXIS 2D v2012 has been
used to interpret the possible benefit of the adopted method. In comparison to the
condition when no preload was used, it has been observed that the application of
staged preloading resulted in a reduction of the total settlement in the range of 45-
90%. Moreover, in comparison to the untreated soil, the application of vertical drains
significantly accelerated the rate of consolidation and dissipation of pore-pressure
(~30-50% and 15-25 times respectively). The comparative results reveal that the
adoption of above methods will substantially help to improve the settlement
characteristics of the soft soil site in discussion.

INTRODUCTION

Foundation comprises of the substructure footing and the surrounding soil within a
influence zone (Das 2009), and serves a direct load transferring medium to the
underlying soil or bedrock. Based on the depth of embedment (D), foundations are
commonly classified as shallow or deep foundations. Raft/Mat foundation is a
preferred category of shallow foundation and is preferred when the individual isolated
footings provided under the structural columns occupy more than 50% of entire
foundation area (Tomlinson 2001). Providing a common platform, such foundations
help in reducing differential settlement arising due to spatially variable soil profile,
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 516

and/or variation in loading between adjacent columns. Spreading of the external

applied load over a large area also assists in the reduction of generated contact stress
beneath the raft foundation.
Compensated raft foundation is a special category of mat foundation where the net
pressure on the foundation soil is further reduced by higher embedment depth of the
foundation and simultaneous construction of a basement wall (Fig. 1). In this case, the
excavated soil is not used further as a backfill which aids in significant reduction of
overburden pressure. Moreover, such adoption helps to bypass the weak overlying
soil to let the footing rest on a comparatively stiffer stratum. The weight of structure
is partially or fully compensated by the weight of excavated soil and hence, provides
a reduction in the subsequent settlements. When the structural load is fully
compensated, the foundation is specially termed as buoyant raft or a floating
foundation (Fig. 1).

(a) (b)

Fig. 1. Types of raft foundations: (a) Compensated raft (b) Buoyant raft.

(a) (b)

Fig. 2. Preloading and surcharge (a) without and (b) with vertical drains

Preloading generally refers to the process of compressing the soil under applied
vertical stress (certain percentage of the expected post-construction stress e.g. 90%)
prior to the actual construction (Staplefeldt 2006, Indraratna et al. 2012). Generally,
the preload is applied in stages (Fig. 2) and is to be ideally removed when the
preload-induced settlement approaches the expected design settlement and/or the
pore-pressure attains a minimal magnitude (~1-5 kPa) after dissipation. As depicted
in Fig. 2, for low-permeable soils, the rate of pore-pressure dissipations is often
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 517

accelerated using vertical drains. After the preload is maintained for a stipulated time
and then removed, a residual pore-pressure remains which is further eliminated after
the actual construction load is applied. Hence, the actual post-construction settlement
mostly has to tackle the settlements arising due to the dissipation of the residual pore-
pressures. Vertical drains accelerate the rate of dissipation and hence, aid in
counteracting the damaging long-term settlement of structures. In some cases, a
surcharge load in excess of a preload is also applied to attain further pre-construction
settlement.
The present article explores the potential of a compensated raft foundation for the
hostel sites at IIT Guwahati. The area is mostly flanked by thick bed (~ 22-25 m) of
soft and compressible marshy fills. Pile foundations have been the general practice
for the foundation construction. In spite of using deep foundations, many hostel
structures have revealed excessive differential settlements and hazardous rigid
rotation and tilting. Fig. 3 depicts the tilted Dibang Hostel at IIT Guwahati, which
hints at improper functioning of the deep foundations due to the gradual dissipation of
pore-pressure and delayed consolidation effect of the soil. Unequal distribution of the
external load might be another cause triggering the tilting of the structures. Owing to
the advantages of compensated raft foundation mentioned earlier, the potential of the
same is explored though numerical modeling and behavioral interpretation of the
foundation system. The site being made of low-permeable soil, the suitability of
preloading the site accompanied by vertical drains have also been investigated, the
results of which have been found to be encouraging and has been described in the
subsequent sections.

Fig. 3. The tilted Dibang Hostel of IIT Guwahati Campus

PROBLEM STATEMENT

The present investigation pertains about the upcoming 1000 seater 10th Boy’s
Hostel in the IIT Guwahati Campus. The structural detailing and the layout of the
hostel have been collected from the Engineering Cell, IIT Guwahati. The hostel
consists of two blocks (A and B) that are geometrically placed as a mirror image of
each other. Figure 4 depicts the floor plan of Block A depicting the plinth and the
floor columns. The hostel have already been designed to be supported on pile
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 518

foundations; however, because of the reasons stated above, this article attempts to
provide an alternative proposal of foundation design for similar upcoming hostels in
the same site. The alternative foundation ventured is a compensated flat-plate mat
foundation resting on a pre-treated soil, the improvement been attained by means of
preloading and vertical drains.

Fig. 4. Layout of the Block-A of 10th Boy’s Hostel, IIT Guwahati Campus

The dimensions of the entire block as shown in Fig. 4 are 113 m x 67 m. The block
is so built that two rectangular annulus regions are surrounded by the residential
rooms for the boarders, the annulus regions being of the dimensions 35 m x 45 m. A
compensated raft foundation beneath the loaded area has been considered as a
modified embedded flat plate mat wherein the soil is not backfilled over the footing.
Rather, the embedment is provided with surrounding structural walls which leads to
the formation of a basement floor. The ground surface can then formed as a grillage
plinth or a floor slab which is connected to the floor of the basement by several prop
columns. In this manner, the compensated raft would facilitate the distribution of
peripheral load over a large area (superstructure load passed on from the columns to
the plinth grillage or plinth slab, which is transferred subsequently to the basement
raft through several of the prop columns), and would result in a basement raft footing
resting on the underlying subsoil and acted upon by nearly uniformly distributed load.
Moreover, in such a scenario, the upper weaker subsoil layers are bypassed and the
compensated raft gets rested on comparatively stiffer layers having more bearing
capacity. This also assures lesser settlement due to the lower compressibility
characteristics of the underlying strata. The differential settlements are also
subsequently reduced due to uniform distribution of stress on the compensated raft.
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 519

PLAXIS FE MODELING

Finite element modelling of the problem has been carried out using PLAXIS 2D
v2012, a finite element package intended for the two dimensional analysis of
deformation and stability problems in geotechnical engineering. A plane-strain
analysis of the problem has been carried out under special considerations. It is
understandable that only the portions of the mat foundation located on the sides of the
rectangular annulus may behave as a plane-strain system (the mat foundation at the
corners of the annulus definitely behaves as a biaxial, and hence, a 3D system). The
primary objective of this study is to assess whether a compensated raft resting on a
pre-treated soil can be a better foundation option at the specified site. Hence, keeping
the primary purpose in view, a plane-strain analysis of the mat foundation has been
carried out, considering the section of mat being 14m wide.
The stratified subsoil has been modelled based on the borehole stratigraphy data
available from the site. Eight borehole surveys (BH1-BH8) were carried out up to a
depth of 30m to identify the soil stratification and estimate their properties. Standard
Penetration Test (SPT) was conducted to estimate the strength of soil in terms of N-
values. Soil samples were collected using a split-spoon sampler and subsequently
tested in the laboratory to identify the primary engineering properties. Water table
was also identified during the borehole survey, and the natural moisture content of the
soil determined from the laboratory tests. Fig. 5 shows the layout of the borehole
survey carried out at the site.

Fig. 5. Layout of the boreholes at the 10th Boys Hostel Site, IIT Guwahati
The borehole surveys (BH1 - BH8) were carried out up to a depth of 25-30 m. The
borehole investigation provided the information about the various parameters of the
soil strata in an interval of 1.5 m. Fig. 6 depicts the variation of the various soil
properties obtained for all the borehole surveys. It can be observed that there is a
significant variation in the strength characteristics of the subsoil strata, although the
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 520

unit weight, void ratio and natural moisture content do not show substantial changes.
Such a spatial variation in the subsoil strength definitely calls for a 3D analysis.
However, in order to assess the efficacy of the proposed compensated raft foundation,
a 2D modelling of the same has been adopted considering single borehole
stratification at a time.

Fig. 6. Engineering properties of subsoil as obtained from eight borehole surveys

The analysed 2D mat has been considered to be resting on the subsoil profile
obtained from each of the eight boreholes. The entire PLAXIS FE model dimension
was chosen as 50 m x 50 m and the mat is placed at the centre of the model geometry
to minimize any model boundary effect. The compensated raft foundation (M25
concrete) of length 14 m and thickness 1m has been modelled by an elastic plate. The
base of the compensated raft is assumed to be located at a depth of 3 m from the
ground surface, which would provide nearly one storey at the basement level.
Standard fixities has been set to the model boundaries which allow for only vertical
movement along the vertical far vertical boundaries, while the bottommost boundary
is restricted from movement in any direction. The water table is set at a location as
obtained from the borehole investigation (mostly located at a depth of 3 m from the
ground surface, and hence, beneath the base of the compensated mat). Borehole
investigations revealed the presence of both sandy and soft clayey soils at different
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 521

locations of the substrata. The highly permeable sandy soil is model as Drained
Mohr-Coulomb (MC) model for both loading and unloading conditions. In order to
accommodate the compression-relaxation-recompression behaviour of the clayey
layers under loading-unloading-reloading phenomenon, the Soft Soil Model (SS) has
been used.
Preload is provided on the ground surface in the form of sand embankment over
the region where 14 m mat will be constructed. The embankment is trapezoidal in
shape with 2:1 slope distribution and a height of 2.5 m. Unit weight of sand is taken
as 22kN/m3 and slope stability of the embankment is assured by providing higher
angle of friction for material used. Vertical drains are provided with a spacing of 2m
c/c beneath the embankment and 3m c/c beyond it. Drains considered are
Prefabricated Vertical Drains (PVDs) whose permeability is theoretically infinite.
Compensated Raft is provided by excavating 3m of soil under the mat and a basement
in form of walls is provided. Material properties of wall used are similar to that of
Mat (M25 concrete) and thickness of wall is taken as 500 mm, as it is a load bearing
shear wall. Based on the structural drawing, the load estimated on the compensated
raft is estimated to be 46.6 MT. Due to the floor construction basement floor, load
distribution on the compensated raft can be treated as uniform loading and the
magnitude of the estimated stress is obtained as 54 kPa (considering only dead and
live loads with factor of safety as 1.5). Fig. 7 depicts the PLAXIS 2D model for the
problem as developed.

Fig. 7. PLAXIS 2D FE model as adopted in the present study

Phases of execution of the FE model

 Phase 1: Initial stress generation – Under self-weight of soil without any external
load. Drains are not active in this phase.
 Phase 2: Construction of preload – 20 days stage construction period executed as
a consolidation analysis phase for the same period, commencing immediately at
the end of initial phase. PVDs are activated from this phase
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 522

 Phase 3: Preloading – Preload embankment maintained for 100 days resulting in

further dissipation of pore-pressures and executed as a consolidation analysis
phase.
 Phase 4: Preload removal - Preload removed quickly within 2 days after the
specified period to ensure lesser rebound of the overconsolidated soil, and
executed as unloading swelling phase.
 Phase 5: Raft construction – The raft construction period of 100 days is executed
as consolidation analysis commencing from the end of Phase 4.
 Phase 6: Long-term settlement – Executed as consolidation analysis with a time
duration being equal to the life-span of building (For the present study, it is set to
20000 days which is approximately equal to 50 years).

In order to assess the benefit of preloading in reducing the post-construction

settlement, additional analysis has been carried out with the raft resting on PVD
treated subsoil where no preloading has been used.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

Estimation of ultimate bearing capacity of compensated raft foundation

The ultimate bearing capacity (qu) of the compensated raft is estimated from the
results from the load-deformation analysis of the same. The raft is subjected to a
progressive staged uniform loading, the maximum magnitude of which is set as 10
MPa/m, and stress-settlement characteristics at a point beneath the centre of the mat is
recorded. Hence, in this manner, application of any empirical or semi-empirical
expression to estimate the bearing capacity is avoided. Fig. 8 depicts the stress-
settlement plots as obtained considering the subsoil profiles from various boreholes,
and as expected, different bearing capacities are obtained owing to the variation in the
subsoil profiles.

Fig. 8. Ultimate bearing capacity and settlement of compensated raft

Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 523

The bearing capacity is estimated from the magnitude of ΣMstage (defined as the
ratio of the applied stress to the maximum stress of 10 MPa) at the point when the
settlement of the raft increases significantly due to the slightest increase in the applied
load. This is indicated in Fig. 8 by a sharp drop in the settlement, with the applied
stress being almost constant. Fig. 8 enlists the bearing capacities and the
corresponding ultimate settlements of the compensated raft foundation. It can be
observed that although the supporting subsoil has a good bearing capacity, the
foundation settlement is significantly high (Permissible settlements – 60 mm for mat
foundations on clayey soils; Punmia, 1998). This ensures the necessity of pre-
treatment of the ground with preloading and subsequent improvement using PVDs.

Efficacy of vertical drains

In order to reduce the post-construction settlements, preloading has been used

accompanied by vertical drains, with a spacing of 2 m c/c, to accelerate the process of
consolidation (Atkinson and Eldred 1982, Indraratna et al. 2000). It can be observed
from Fig. 9a that there is a significant increase in settlement in a same time-frame
when the vertical drains is used, thus suggesting that the pore-water had been
dissipated in an accelerated manner. In this process, the final settlement of the
preloaded soil can be obtained with significant saving in time. For example, a
settlement of 6cm is attained in 50 days when no drains have been used, while the
same is attained in 17 days when preloading is assisted by vertical drains. Similarly,
in 120 days, the excess pore pressure dissipated without drains is in the range of
1kPa, while the same is obtained as 22 kPa when assisted by vertical drains.

(a) (b)

Fig. 9. Efficacy of (a) Vertical Drains and (b) Preloading

Efficacy of preloading

In order to assess the benefit of preloading, the compensated raft resting on PVD
treated subsoil is analysed without preloading. Fig. 9b depicts a typical time-
displacement curves for both types of analyses. Without the use of preload, it is
observed that the raft undergoes 34 mm of consolidation settlement. When preloading
is applied, 77 mm of consolidation settlement is recorded in 120 days followed by a
Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 524

rebound of 23 mm as preload is removed. Upon construction of the raft, a further

consolidation settlement of 9 mm is observed. Hence, a net post-construction
settlement of 16 mm is observed when the soil is treated with preloading in presence
of vertical drains. This ensures the efficacy of preloading in reducing the post-
construction settlement. This exercise is repeated considering the subsoil profiles
obtained from all the borehole surveys, and in each case, in comparison to the
settlements obtained for a non-preloaded soil, a significant reduction in the post-
construction settlement in the range of 20-135mm had been observed. Moreover, the
post-construction settlement of the compensated raft foundation resting on preloaded
soil assisted by vertical drains considering any subsoil stratigraphy ranges from 16
mm-34 mm. These values are well within the permissible limits of maximum
settlement of raft foundation allowed in clayey stratum (~60 mm).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

Based on the present study, it has been recognised that the compensated raft
foundation could substantially enhance the bearing capacity and resist the large
settlement problems in the concerned area. It has been also noted that preloading, if
used without vertical drains, is not as such beneficial since the time required to
achieve the final settlement is not reduced. When used in combination with vertical
drains, which help in accelerated consolidation, the efficacy of the preloading has
been observed to be significant in limiting the post-construction within the
permissible limits. For the subsoil profiles obtained from various boreholes in the site,
adoption of such technique has resulted in the reduction of total post-construction
settlement in the tune of 20-135 mm. The post-construction settlement of the
preloaded soil has been reduced to magnitudes of 16-30 mm, which are well within
the permissible limits of the mat foundations resting on clayey soil (~ 60 mm). Hence,
the attempt made is designing an alternative foundation for the hostel site is found to
be efficient and satisfactory.

REFERENCES

Atkinson, M.S. and Eldred, P.J.L. (1982). “Consolidation of soil using vertical
drains.” Vertical Drains, 33-43. London: Thomas Telford Ltd.
Das, B.M. (2009). Shallow foundations: Bearing capacity and settlement, CRC Press,
Boca Raton, USA.
Gupta, S.C. (1997). Raft foundations design and analysis with a practical approach,
New Age International Limited, India.
Indraratna, B., Salim, W. and Redana, I. W. (2000). “Predicted and pbserved behavior
of soft clay foundations stabilized with vertical drains” Proc. ICGGE, I, 1-7.
Indraratna, B., Rujikiatkamjorn, C., Balasubramanium, A. S. and McIntosh, G. (2012)
“Soft ground improvement via vertical drains and vacuum assisted preloading”
Geotextiles and Geomembranes, 30, 16-23.
Meyerhof, G.G. (1951). “The ultimate bearing capacity of foundations.”
Geotechnique, 2, 301-322.
 Ground Improvement and Geosynthetics GSP 238 © ASCE 2014 525

Punmia, B.C. (1998). Soil Mechanics and foundations, LPP Ltd, India.
Stapelfeldt, T. (2006). Preloading and vertical drains, Helsinki University of
Technology, Norway.
Tomlinson, M.J. (2001). Foundation design and construction, Pearson Education
Ltd., USA.

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