Generalized cyclic p–y curve modeling for analysis of laterally loaded piles

Owing to their simplicity and reasonable accuracy, Beam on Nonlinear Winkler Foundation (BNWF) models are widely used for the analysis of laterally loaded piles. Their main drawback is idealizing the soil continuum with discrete uncoupled springs representing the soil reactions to pile movement. Static p–y curves, obtained from limited full-scaled field tests, are generally used as a backbone curve of the model. However, these empirically derived p–y curves could not incorporate the effects of various pile properties and soil continuity. The strain wedge method (SWM) has been improved to assess the nonlinear p–y curve response of laterally loaded piles based on a three-dimensional soil–pile interaction through a passive wedge developed in front of the pile. In this paper, the SWM based p–y curve is implemented as the backbone curves of developed BNWF model to study the nonlinear response of single pile under cyclic lateral loading. The developed nonlinear model is capable of accounting for various important soil–pile interaction response features such as soil and pile yielding, cyclic degradation of soil stiffness and strength under generalized loading, soil–pile gap formation with soil cave-in and recompression, and energy dissipation. Some experimental tests are studied to verify the BNWF model and examine the effect of each factor on the response of laterally loaded pile embedded in sand and clay. The experimental data and computed results agree well, confirming the model ability to predict the response of piles under one-way and two-way cyclic loading. The results show that the developed model can satisfactorily simulate the pile stiffness hardening due to soil cave in and sand densification as observed in the experiment. It is also concluded from the results that the gap formation and soil degradation have significant effects on the increase of lateral pile-head deflection and maximum bending moment of the pile in cohesive soils. •A BNWF model is developed using strain wedge method based p–y.•Accounts for pile yielding, soil cyclic degradation, pile- soil interface discontinuity.•Verified against centrifuge and full scale pile cyclic load tests.•In clay, gap formation/soil degradation increase pile deflection and bending moment.•Sand cave-in reduces demand on pile and reduces its structural damage.