Vertical load on a conduit buried under a sloping ground

Abstract

Conduits are commonly installed below the ground for utility conveyance around the world. Vertical load on a buried conduit is an important parameter that needs to be known to ensure its safe design and installation. Consideration of soil arching in load calculations helps achieve a more realistic and efficient design. In the past, considering the arching effect, the design charts have been presented for use by practicing engineers to calculate the vertical load on the conduit buried below the level ground. There are currently no design charts for calculating the vertical load on the conduit buried under a sloping ground. In this paper, an attempt has been made to present the derivation of a generalized analytical expression considering that the soil mass overlying the conduit has a sloping face and the arching phenomenon takes place. The developed generalized expression has been used to present some design charts considering specific values of slope geometry, soil properties and burial depths. Furthermore, analytical results for specific soil parameters have been compared with the results extracted from a commercial software PLAXIS 2D, for a developed numerical model and an independent study.

RAS ID

39690

Document Type

Journal Article

Date of Publication

2021

Volume

24

Issue

6

School

School of Engineering

Copyright

subscription content

Publisher

Techno-Press

Comments

Khan, M. U. A., & Shukla, S. K. (2021). Vertical load on a conduit buried under a sloping ground. Geomechanics and Engineering, 24(6), 599-610. https://doi.org/10.12989/gae.2021.24.6.599

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Link to publisher version (DOI)

10.12989/gae.2021.24.6.599