Numerical Assessment of Squeezed Branch Pile in Silty Clay Soil

Squeezed Branch Pile is derived on the basis of caste in place concrete pile. It has one or more branches along the pile shaft at design depth. Squeezed branch piles are often used in high rise building, transmission tower and in other pile foundations where anticipated uplift or vertical load may cause failure. This pile is one of the excellent options of pile foundation for soft soil and silty soil. The behaviour of Squeezed Branch pile is difficult to explain using simple pile-soil theories or two dimensional numerical analyses because of complicated geometry of pile.In the present numerical analysis, a 3D pile-soil model of conventional circular pile and squeezed branch pile foundations are analysed using MIDAS GTS NX finite element software to find out effectiveness of squeezed branch pile over conventional pile. The aim is to study the performance of Squeezed Branch Pile foundation in silty clay with respect to various parameters such as types of loading, branch diameter, branch spacing and number of branches. Analysis shows that the squeezed branch pile has higher vertical, lateral and uplift load capacity as compared to conventional pile.