Response of Triangular Strip Shell Foundations Subjected to Lateral Loading

In civil engineering, foundations are mainly subjected to pressure forces, but foundations of structures such as transmission towers, radio and television towers are often subjected to lateral forces, wind and/or earth quake loads. The concept of using shells as foundation element has proven to provide better performance than conventional shallow foundation in terms of bearing capacity. This paper presents the results of experimental and analytical study performed to quantify the efficacy of lateral load carrying capacity of triangular strip shell foundation on loose sand. In this study a series of small-scale model experiments on triangular strip shell foundations were performed and the results were compared with those of conventional flat strip foundation. The study examined the effect of two significant factors, shell configuration and embedment depth, on the lateral capacity of shell foundations. The dimensionless factor, shell efficiency factor was used to illustrate the increase in the ultimate lateral load of a shell foundation in comparison to its flat counterpart. Settlement factor was introduced to present the settlement characteristics. The lateral resistance of triangular strip shell foundations and conventional flat strip foundations, were also determined analytically using MATLAB code generation. The analytical analysis results show a reasonably good agreement with laboratory experimental results. The results indicated that the lateral load resistance of shell foundations is significantly greater than flat foundations, which could lead to an increase in their use.