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The Study of t-z and q-z curves on Bored Pile Based on The Results of
Instrumented Pile Load Test in Medium and Stiff Clays

Conference Paper · July 2013

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 Proceedings of Pile 2013, June 2-4th 2013

THE STUDY OF t-z AND q-z CURVES ON BORED PILE BASED ON THE RESULTS OF
INSTRUMENTED PILE LOAD TEST IN MEDIUM AND STIFF CLAYS

Aswin Lim1, Aksan Kwanda2 and Paulus P. Rahardjo3.

1 Faculty member, Parahyangan Catholic University, Jl. Ciumbuleuit No. 94 Bandung, INDONESIA
2 Graduate Student, Parahyangan Catholic University, Jl. Ciumbuleuit No. 94 Bandung, INDONESIA
3 Professor, Parahyangan Catholic University, Jl. Ciumbuleuit No. 94 Bandung, INDONESIA

ABSTRACT : This paper presents the result of t-z and q-z curves based on instrumented bored pile which is constructed
in layered soils consist of medium and stiff clay. There are fourteen vibrating wire strain gauges (VWSGs) installed at
seven various level of bored pile and two tell-tale extensometers are installed inside the pile located at pile head and pile
tip. Based on the axial loading test (ASTM D1143-07), the bored pile is tested until 250% of working load that is 1325
ton. Then the t-z and q-z curves are developed based on the data that are recorded from VWSGs and tell-tale
extensometer. Two variation of pile elastic modulus are used, that are fc’ = 25 MPa (original modulus) and fc’= 42 MPa
(calibrated modulus), in order to fit the actual load settlement curve from axial load test. The result shows that
calibrated modulus gives nearly similar with actual load settlement curve instead of original modulus. Although the
load-settlement curve could be fitted with pile elastic modulus calibration, it has slight different with t-z curve for clay
soil that proposed by Reese and O’Neill,1988.

Keywords : t-z curve, q-z curve, instrumented bored pile, medium and stiff clay, axial load test.

INTRODUCTION z program which is developed by Rahardjo et al (1993)

based on Reese’s Method.
The subgrade reaction, or t-z, method suggested
by Seed and Reese (1957) is an expedient means of SOILS CONDITION AND PILE
computing the axial movement of a pile under axial load. INSTRUMENTATION DATA
Procedures are available to generate the relationships
between shear stress at the pile shaft ( load transfer, t ) The soils stratification is classified based on
and pile displacement, z, along the pile shaft. The most pile boring record. The soil condition is dominated by
commonly used procedures, however, are empirical and cohesive soils ( medium and stiff clays). They start from
based on data from tests on short piles, usually less than elevation +8.00 until +3.00, then followed by cemented
30 meter long, with diameters less than 0,5 meter. Pile sand on elevation +3.00 until +6.50, and cohesive soils
diameter, axial pile stiffness, pile length, and distribution again until elevation -39.00. The length of the bored pile
of soil strength and stiffness along the pile are all factors is 47.00 meter with 1.2 m diameter.
that influence t-z behavior. The success in developing
realistic t-z relationships for a pile depends on the Table 1. Soil stratification and pile sub section length
accuracy of the ultimate load-transfer values of the soil Segment Elevation Pile Length Soil Type
(pile capacity), the distribution of those values along the
pile, and the displacement characteristics of soil during Depth (m) (m)
load transfer ( Kraft et al, 1981). A +8,00 - +3,00 5 Medium Clay
Finite difference equations are employed to
B +3,00 - -6,50 9.5 Cemented Sand
achieve compatibility between pile displacement and the
load transfer along a pile and between displacement and C1 -6,50 - -13,00 6.5 Medium Clay
resistance at the tip of the pile. This method was first C2 -13,00 - -20,00 7 Medium Clay
used by Seed and Reese (1957); other studies have been D -20,00 - -24,00 4 Stiff Clay
reported by Coyle and Reese (1966), Coyle and
Sulaiman (1967), and Kraft et al (1981). The t-z E -24,00 - -29,00 5 Medium Clay
difference method assumes the Winkler concept; that is, F -29,00 - -31,00 2 Stiff Clay
the load transfer at a certain pile section and the pile tip G -31,00 - -36,00 5 Medium Clay
resistance are independent of the pile displacement
elsewhere. The close agreement between the prediction H -36,00 - -39,00 3 Stiff Clay
and the loading test results in clays (Coyle and Reese,
1966) and the scattering of prediction values for the Table 1 shows the soil stratification and pile
loading test in sands (Coyle and Sulaiman, 1967) may sub section length. There are fourteen vibrating wire
possibly be explained by the relative sensitivity of a soil strain gauges (VWSGs) installed at seven various level
to changes in patterns of stress (Reese et al, 2006). In of bored pile, which at elevation =6.50, -5.10, -13.10, -
this paper, the difference method is accommodated by t- 20.10, -26.10, -32.10, and -37.60, respectively on both
sides of pile, and two tell-tale extensometers are installed
inside the pile located at pile head (elevation +6.10)and
pile tip (elevation -38.80).
Figure 1 shows the bored pile with VWSGs
diagram inside the soil to make clear understanding of
the pile instrumentation location. The tell-tale rod
extensometer assembly consisted of 9.5 mm diameter
stainless stell rod, attached to a fixed anchor point in the
pile, and placed within a protective 25 mm PVC pipe.
The entire assembly is cast in the pile. As the pile
compressed under specified test load, the steel rod
remained free in the protective PVC pipe, which undergo
compression with the concrete pile. Four dial gauges
with accuracy 0.01 mm are used to measure the
downward movement of the steel rod, relative to
reference beam. The bored pile is design with concrete
strength, fc’, equal to 25 MPa and the reinforcement is
12D25. The measured of concrete cylinder strength is
about 275 kg/cm2 in day seventh. The bored pile is
concreted by tremie method in order to make sure that
the mud at the tip of bore hole will be pushed outside by
the concrete.
Thus, the bored pile waiting period is around 2 months.
In this condition, the concrete strength has reached
ultimate strength because the concreting period has
passed 28 days. The axial load was applied using two
hydraulic jacks of 1000 tons capacity on the pile head.
Kentledge concrete blocks, primary and secondary
beams were used for reaction system. Four dial gauges
and survey instrument were used to measure the
settlement at the pile top. The bored pile was designed
for a working load (WL) of 530 ton and the loading
schedule was conducted in five cycles. The maximum
applied load for each cycle was 265 ton ( 50% WL), 530
ton (100%WL), 795 ton (150%WL), 1060 (200%WL),
and 1325 ton (250%WL). In this paper, the fifth cycle
data were used for analysis of t-z and q-z curves since
the data have completed. Table 2 shows the load
settlement data from axial loading at fifth cycle at pile
head and pile tip recorded from tell-tale and Table 3
shows the average data recorded from VWSGs at each
level.
Table 2. The load settlement data from axial loading at
fifth cycle

Load Settlement (mm)

(ton)
Pile head Pile Tip
0
265 2.79 2.28
530 3.92 2.28
795 5.27 4.67
1060 6.85 4.73
1193 8.29 5.55
1325 20.35 12.08

Table 3. The average data recorded by VWSGs at each

levels.
Applied Level
Load A B C D E F G
(ton) 6.5 -5.1 -13.1 -20.1 -26.1 -32.1 -37.6
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
265 69 50 45 14 9 5 2
530 135 96 88 38 25 15 2
795 204 145 142 72 44 25 6
1060 283 215 202 122 74 37 9
1192.5 322 256 239 156 94 56 16
1325 385 322 296 201 140 76 25
1060 376 239 167 93 58 38 11
795 305 225 160 87 55 35 35
Fig 1. Bored pile section 530 126 81 24 -13 -13 -11 -17
265 71 35 19 4 1 1 -7
PILE AXIAL LOADING TEST
0 17 -11 13 20 15 12 4
The bored pile was installed on October 31,
2012, and the axial loading test was conducted on
December 5 – 8, 2012 according to ASTM D1143-07.
DEVELOPMENT OF t-z CURVE AND q-z CURVE
The development of t-z curve is divided to two
major, that are, calculating t and calculating z. The
principal of calculating t is adopted from Hooke’s Law
where stress is strain multiply with modulus. Then, when
the stress divided with cross section area of pile, the
axial force will be obtained. Finally, the t could be
computed from the axial force divided with pile section
peripheral area. Figure 2 shows the load transfer for
each loadings along the pile (fc’ = 25 MPa). Moreover,
the principal for calculating z is by subtracting the
shortening of the pile from observed settlement. Here,
the shortening of the pile is calculated from tell-tale data.
Fig. 2 The Load Transfer For Each Loadings Along The
Pile (fc’=25 Mpa)
The original elastic modulus of the bored pile is
235000 kg/cm2. The medium clay soil stratification is
divided into 5 segments, namely segment A, segment C1,
segment C2, segment E, and segment G, with length of
each segment is 5 meter, 6.5 meter, 7 meter, 5 meter, and
5 meter, respectively. The t-z curve for medium clay
with fc’=25 MPa is shown in Figure 3.
Fig. 3 The t-z curve for medium clay with fc’=25 MPa
The dash lines represent the calculated t-z curve,
while the solid lines represent the regression t-z curve
into linear elastic fully plastic behavior (as input in t-z
program). The computed t-z curves are relatively like
hyperbolic function. From Figure 3, it shows that the
highest t is on segment C2, while the lowest is on
segment C1. These two sections actually are stick
together, however from this result, the soil shear strength
of segment C2 should be larger than segment C1. The
zm, maximum movement to fully mobilized shear
strength, is around 4.0 – 6.7 mm. With the same
procedure as above, the stiff clay sections, namely
section D (4 meter), section F (2 meter), and section H (3
meter) t-z curves is shown in Figure 4.
Fig. 4 The t-z curve for stiff clay with fc’=25 MPa
The largest t is at Section D, while the lowest t
is at section H and the zm is around 3.5 to 6.0 mm. When
the normalized t-z curves are plotted into Reese and
O’Neill’s normalized t-z curves in clay, the results show
that most of the curves, medium as well as stiff clays,
laying below the lower boundary as shown in Figure 5.
Fig. 5 The normalized t-z curves comparison (fc’=25
MPa)
Finally, the load settlement curve prediction is
calculated from the t-z curves, however, the load
settlement curve is smaller than the actual ones. It seems
that the pile elastic modulus is too small, beside Figure 2
also shows that the maximum axial load for final load is
around 1000 ton. In order to get the closer result of load
settlement curve, the trial-error method is used with
changing the pile elastic modulus. The best fitted result
of pile elastic modulus is 304600 kg/cm2 (fc’=42 MPa).
Figure 6 shows the load transfer for each loadings along
the pile (fc’ = 42 MPa) with the maximum axial load at
final loading is around 1325 ton. Figure 7 and Figure 8
also show the t-z curves for medium clay and stiff clay
soils with the same trend line with Figure 3 and Figure
4, except that the t values are larger than previous one.
normalized t-z curves laying inside the range of results,
while the stiff clay normalized t-z curves remain the
same as before.
For the q-z curves, the q value is obtained from
the axial load at pile tip divided with pile cross section
area, and the z is obtained from the pile tip movement
(tell-tale data). ). Figure 10 shows the q-z curves at pile
tip. The straight line is for pile elastic modulus equal to
235000 kg/cm2, and the dashed line reflects pile elastic
modulus equal to 304600 kg/cm2. The result is consistent
with t-z curves where the larger axial load gives larger q
values.

Fig. 6 The Load Transfer For Each Loadings Along The

Pile (fc’=42 Mpa)

Fig. 9 The normalized t-z curves comparison

(fc’=42MPa)

Fig. 7 The t-z curve for medium clay with fc’ = 42 MPa

Fig. 10 The q-z curves for stiff clay

Finally, all of the load settlement results are

summarized in Table 4 and Figure 11. The load
settlement prediction result obtained from pile concrete
strength equal to 42 MPa is nearly close to actual curve.

Table 4. The load-settlement data comparison between

Fig. 8 The t-z curve for stiff clay with fc’= 42 MPa field data and t-z prediction
Field data fc' = 25 Mpa fc' = 42 Mpa
The zm values have slight different, where
Axial Load Settlement Axial Load Settlement Axial Load Settlement
medium clay is around 4.2 – 6.5 mm, and stiff clay is
(ton) (cm) (ton) (cm) (ton) (cm)
around 3.7 – 6.0 mm. In addition, regarding with the
comparison with Reese and O’Neill’s normalized t-z 0 0 0 0 0 0

curves as shown in Figure 9, the medium clay 265 2.79 783.929 6.3 1061.234 7.56
 530 3.92 892.68 8.91 1182.33 10.19 3. The movement to fully mobilize the shear
795 5.27 893.338 8.94 1183.102 10.23
strength, zm, concurs with Reese and O’Neill
1060 6.85 908.129 9.8 1198.601 11.16
previous study results which is around 0.2 – 0.6
% ratio of settlement to diameter of shaft.
1192.5 8.29 1011.444 17.28 1301.916 18.57

1325 20.35 1059.128 20.7 1349.599 21.99

Fig 11. Load Settlement curves
DISCUSSION
The main purpose of this study obtains the t-z
curve and q-z curve of medium and stiff clays based on
instrumented bored pile data. Several things could be
noted likes the calibration of pile elastic modulus, the
shape of calculated t-z curves, and the maximum
movement to mobilized maximum shear strength. The
calibration of pile elastic modulus is done in order to get
the closest t-z load settlement prediction curve compare
to actual curve. The pile elastic modulus is become
larger than original, it might be caused by the time of
axial load testing. From pile recording data, the concrete
strength at seventh days has reach design value, which is
fc’=25 MPa. The axial load testing is done after one
month of concreting, of course the concrete strength will
reach larger than original or design value because the
strength of concrete increases by time. Regarding to the
shape of calculated t-z curves, some of the curves do not
reflect the ideal curve that is hyperbolic shape. It might
be due to the instrumentation data are not recorded
excellently. However, the error could be tolerated since
the results of t-z curve could predict an excellent load-
settlement curve. For maximum movement to fully
mobilize the shear strength, the results shows that fully
agree with Reese and O’Neill, which is around 2.4 – 7.2
mm for 1.2 meter pile diameter.
REFERENCES
Coyle, H.M., and Reese, L.C. (1966). Load Transfer For
Axially Loaded Piles In Clay. Journal of the Soil
Mechanics and Foundation Division. ASCE. 92 : 1 –
26.
Coyle, H.M., and Sulaiman, I.H. (1967). Skin Friction
For Steel Piles In Sand. Journal of the Soil
Mechanics and Foundation Division. ASCE. 93 : 261
– 278.
Kraft, L.M., Ray, R.P. and Kagawa, T. (1981).
Theoretical of t-z Curves. J. Geotech. Engrg. ASCE.
107(11):1543-1561.
Rahardjo, P.P., Cosmas, R., and Rosnawati, I. (1992).
TZ Program Komputer Untuk Analisis Pengalihan
Beban Pada Pondasi Tiang Yang Dibebani Aksial.
Parahyangan Catholic University. Geotechnical
Engineering Centre.
Reese, L.C., and M.W. O’Neill. (1988). Field Load Test
of Drilled Shaft. ."Proceedings, Deep Foundations on
Bored and Auger Piles, Ed. WF Van Impe, Balkema,
Rotterdam: 145-192.
Reese, L.C., Isenhower, W.M., Wang, S.T., (2006).
Analysis of Design of Shallow and Deep Foundations.
John Wiley and Sons.
Seed, H.B., and Reese, L.C. (1957). The Action Of Soft
Clay Along Friction Piles. Transactions. ASCE. 122 :
731 – 754.

CONCLUSIONS
Based on this study, several conclusions can be
drawn, such as :
1. The load settlement prediction curve is
successfully simulated with calculated t-z
curves, though the pile elastic modulus should
be calibrated.
2. The normalized t-z curves for medium clay is
located inside Reese and O’Neill range of result
while stiff clay is located below the lower
boundary.

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