Long-Term Response of Piles to Cyclic Lateral Loading Following Vibratory and Impact Driving in Water-Saturated Sand

Abstract

The influence of the pile installation by vibratory or impact driving on the response to subsequent cyclic lateral loading, as faced in the offshore environment, is investigated numerically. Large-deformation analyses of the pile installation process using the coupled Eulerian–Lagrangian method considering partially drained conditions are performed. Following the installation, one million lateral load cycles are simulated using the high-cycle accumulation (HCA) model. The lower the hydraulic conductivity of the soil during driving, the higher the accumulation of lateral deformation when the pile is subjected to high-cyclic loading. The assumption of ideally drained conditions during pile driving results in a lower accumulation, in particular for the vibratory-driven pile. Compared to the influence of the drainage conditions during driving, the influence of the installation method is found to be of less importance. While the vibratory-driven piles tend to give less resistance to monotonic lateral loading for most conditions, slightly lower permanent pile head rotations after one million lateral loading cycles are observed compared to the impact-driven piles.