• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.3 no.3_4
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• pp.549-561
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• 2012

Many building foundations are embedded, however it is not easy to compact the backfill around the foundation especially for the deeply embedded ones. The soil condition around the embedded foundation may affect the seismic response of a building due to the weak contact between the soil and the foundation. In this paper, the response accelerations in the short-period range and at the period of 1 second (in the long-period range) for a seismic design spectrum specified in the IBC design code were compared considering perfect and poor backfills to investigate the effect of backfill compaction around the embedded foundation. An in-house finite-element software (P3DASS) which has the capability of horizontal pseudo-3D seismic analysis with linear soil layers was used to perform the seismic analyses of the structure-soil system with an embedded foundation. Seismic analyses were carried out with 7 bedrock earthquake records provided by the Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center (PEER), scaling the peak ground accelerations to 0.1 g. The results indicate that the poor backfill is not detrimental to the seismic response of a building, if the foundation is not embedded deeply in the soft soil. However, it is necessary to perform the seismic analysis for the structure-soil system embedded deeply in the soft soil to check the seismic resonance due to the soft soil layer beneath the foundation, and to compact the backfill as well as possible.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2010.09a
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• pp.1065-1072
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• 2010

The excavation site in the new city of inchon songdo is distributed with soft reclaimed soil and marine deposit. So, the general ground anchor is not applied to this layer of soft ground as the earth retaining support system, because of settlement. And then, Jacket pack anchor which is newly developed in order to increasing the pullout resistance by certain grout bulb formation and expansion effect in soft ground is applied to this site instead of the general ground anchor. Though the maximum horizontal displacement shows about 30mm~100mm (The maximum horizontal displacement/excavation depth$\fallingdotseq$0.32~1.0%) according to excavation sequence, generally excavation work finished stably. Also, load cell after setting shows almost increasing trend with increasing horizontal displacement. It means that the settlement of Jacket pack anchor in soft ground is good. From the result of this case, we knew that Jacket pack anchor was able to use the earth retaining support system in soft ground. Using Jacket pack anchor in soft ground, The allowance of the horizontal displacement is applied more than general value considering soil factors.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.28 no.8
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• pp.89-99
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• 2012

The expansion of a road on soft ground could induce an additional settlement to the existing road because of the consolidation characteristics of the soft soil layer subjected to additional load by an adjacent banking. In such case, the existing road could be faced with various problems during the stages of the construction and maintenance, such as deterioration of not only the surface smoothness yielding the decrease in automobile performance safety but also the structural stability of the embankment. These kinds of problems are expected to occur more freguently especially for the deep ground level with a fairly thick soft soil layer. Therefore, they should be examined and studied adequately during the design stage. As a reference case study, this paper deals with the project named Namhae Expressway of 2nd Branch with the soft soil layer with the thickness upto about 50m. After a lengthy review of the original design, an improved design is proposed.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.175-185
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• 2015

Jack-up type WTIV(Wind Turbine Installation Vessel) is used to avoid the effects of waves when installing wind turbines in the Southwest Sea of South Korea. During the preloading procedure, unexpected penetration may cause some risks such as excessive penetration or punch-through failure. To ensure the safety of the WTIV during preloading, the bearing capacities should be evaluated based on the soil data at each borehole. Eight boreholes (OW-1 to -8) have been drilled in the Southwest Sea of South Korea. The bearing capacities of a spudcan designed to be used in this district are calculated using both a conventional analysis and finite element analysis with the soil properties of OW-1 to -8. A finite element analysis is carried out for OW-1, -3, and -4 to gain an in-depth understanding of the soil behavior during the penetration. OW-1, -3, and -4 are representative boreholes for a strong layer overlying a soft layer, a general soft layer, and a soft layer overlying a strong layer, respectively. The resultant bearing capacity curves versus the depth of the numerical analysis are compared with the conventional method. The results show that the conventional analysis is conservative. Case studies for different spudcan areas and shapes are also conducted to seek an appropriate spudcan type for the Southwest Sea of South Korea. Finally, a spudcan with a rectangular shape and a bearing area of $112.8m^2$ is selected.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.19-27
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• 2001

In this seismic analyses of structures, it is well recognized that the effects of soil-structure interaction can not be ignored and seismic responses of a structure taking into account the stiffnesses of a foundation-soil system show the significant difference from those with a rigid base. However, current seismic analyses of apartment building structures were carried out with the rigid base ignoring the characteristics of the foundation and the properties of the underlying soil. In this study, seismic analyses of wall-slob type apartment buildings which have a particular structural type were carried out taking into account the soft soil layer comparing seismic response spectra of a flexible base with those of a rigid base and UBC-97. Low-rise or middle height wall-slab type apartment buildings built on the deep soft soil layer showed a rigid body motion with the reduced seismic responses due to the base isolation effect, indicating that it is considerably safe but uneconomical to utilize the design spectra of UB-97 for the seismic design of wall-slab type apartment buildings due to conservative design.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.117-130
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• 2011

The methods of design available for geocell-supported embankments are very few. Two of the earlier methods are considered in this paper and a third method is proposed and compared with them. In the first method called slip line method, plastic bearing failure of the soil was assumed and the additional resistance due to geocell layer is calculated using a non-symmetric slip line field in the soft foundation soil. In the second method based on slope stability analysis, general-purpose slope stability program was used to design the geocell mattress of required strength for embankment. In the third method proposed in this paper, geocell reinforcement is designed based on the plane strain finite element analysis of embankments. The geocell layer is modelled as an equivalent composite layer with modified strength and stiffness values. The strength and dimensions of geocell layer is estimated for the required bearing capacity or permissible deformations. These three design methods are compared through a design example. It is observed that the design method based on finite element simulations is most comprehensive because it addresses the issue of permissible deformations and also gives complete stress, deformation and strain behaviour of the embankment under given loading conditions.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2008.03a
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• pp.1036-1041
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• 2008

In order to analysis the reason of sliding failure in embankment slope under construction in soft soil area, a model section located in Gimhae Region in Gyeongsangnam-Do, where the sliding failure had been occurred during embankment works in soft soil area, had been selected. This area had been firstly treated with the Pack Drain Method, and additional embankment works of 9.7 meters out of total 14 meters in thickness had been under construction. The results of analysis showed that the reason of sliding failure were overspeed in embankment construction and the overestimation of design factors in calculating strength of each layer of embankment and poor management and inaccuracy reading of measurement devices.

• Proceedings of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea Conference
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• 2000.10a
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• pp.98-107
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• 2000

Free-field ground motion during earthquake is significantly affected by the local site conditions and it is essential for the seismic design to perform the ground response analysis In this study, ground response analyses based on the equivalent linear method were carried out to evaluate the effects of various ground conditions on the site amplification. Four major factors including the depth of the site(very soft and dense soil), the impedance ratio between soil layer and bed rock, linear analysis versus equivalent linear analysis, and the location of soft soil layer were deeply discussed. Based on the analysis results, the importance of various local site conditions on the site amplification was emphasized.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.153-162
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• 2007

For the reinforced earth wall constructed on a soft ground in parallel with replacing soft soils, the behavior of the wall according to variations of thickness and stiffness of soft layer, replacement depth, and wall height is investigated using a finite element method, in which incremental construction steps including consolidation of soft soil layer are considered. The behavior of wall is characterized by investigating displacements and settlements developing at the wall, and shear strains developing in a soil deposit. The stability of wall is, then, evaluated by comparing these values with the safety criteria determined on the basis of the literature. Based on the investigation, it is shown that the behavior of wall is influenced naturally from soft soil thickness(t), replacement depth(d) and wall height(h), but more significantly from d and h. In addition, it is also shown that the normalized replacement depth, d/h, required for the safety of wall is not influenced significantly by the variations of t and h. Consequently, it can be concluded that the proper replacement depth can be suggested in an equivalent value in terms of d/h, even for the cases where the wall height is varying with stations, but the variation is not significant.

• Journal of Korean Society of Steel Construction
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.173-180
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• 2006

The seismic responses of a building are affected by the base soil conditions. In this study, linear time-history seismic analysis and nonlinear pushover static seismic analysis were performed to estimate the base shear forces of 3-, 5-, and 7-story steel buildings, considering the rigid and soft soil conditions. Foundation soil stiffness, based on the equivalent static stiffness formula, is used for the damper, one of the Link elements in SAP 2000. The base shear forces of the steel buildings, estimated through time-history analysis using the general-purpose structural-analysis program of SAP 2000, were compared with those calculated using the domestic seismic design code, the UBC-97 design response spectrum. and pushover static nonlinear analysis. The steel buildings designed for gravity and wind loads showed elastic responses with a moderate earthquake of 0.11 g, while the elastic soft-soil layer increased the displacement and the base shear force of the buildings due to soil-structure interaction and soil amplification. Therefore, considering the characteristics of the soft-soil layer, it is more reasonable to perform an elastic seismic analysis of a building's structure during weak or moderate earthquakes.