The efficiency of granular pile anchor foundation system in reducing heave of Irbid expansive clayey soil: An experimental investigation

This study is devoted to investigate the efficiency of granular pile anchor (GPA) in controlling heave of shallow foundations constructing over expansive soils. In this study heave measurements were made on laboratory model footings reinforced with GPAs having different diameter (3 cm, 4 cm and 5 cm) and embedded length (20 cm, 30 cm and 40 cm). The GPAs foundation system was constructed on expansive clay compacted in a steel box 60 cm in diameter and 70 cm in height. The measured percent reduction in heave was found to increase with increasing embedded length and diameter of GPA. The experiments conducted in this study showed that the percent reduction in heave when using GPAs may reach as high as 93 %. A theoretical formulation for the prediction of the percent reduction in heave was developed in this study. A comparison of the predicted percent reduction in heave using the developed formulation with the measured values in this study indicated good agreement and suggested that the proposed formulation in this study can be used to estimate the percent reduction in heave of shallow foundations constructing over expansive soils reinforced with GPAs.