An approximate analysis procedure for piled raft foundations

A piled raft foundation comprises both piles and a pile cap that itself transmits load directly to the ground. The aim of such a foundation is to reduce the number of piles compared with a more conventional piled foundation where the bearing effect of the pile cap, or raft, is ignored. This paper describes a 'hybrid' approach for the analysis of piled raft foundations, based on a load transfer treatment of individual piles, together with elastic interaction between different piles and with the raft. The numerical analysis is used to evaluate a simple approximate method of estimating the overall response of the foundation from the response of the component parts. The method leads to estimates of the overall foundation stiffness, the proportion of load carried by the pile group and the raft, and an initial assessment of differential settlements. Parametric studies are presented showing the effect of factors such as raft stiffness and pile spacing, length and stiffness, and a worked example is included demonstrating the accuracy of the approximate design approach.