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Relieving Platforms: 8.2.3 Crib Walls

1) Retaining walls must be reinforced with steel to resist bending moments from lateral soil pressures. Horizontal concrete platforms can be added within the backfill to reduce bending moments. 2) Counterfort walls use vertical supports spaced along the wall to transfer loads and allow taller heights than conventional retaining walls. 3) Crib walls and gabion walls are flexible structures made of prefabricated wood, concrete, or metal cages filled with stone. They are suitable for heights up to 6.5 meters.

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33 views

Relieving Platforms: 8.2.3 Crib Walls

1) Retaining walls must be reinforced with steel to resist bending moments from lateral soil pressures. Horizontal concrete platforms can be added within the backfill to reduce bending moments. 2) Counterfort walls use vertical supports spaced along the wall to transfer loads and allow taller heights than conventional retaining walls. 3) Crib walls and gabion walls are flexible structures made of prefabricated wood, concrete, or metal cages filled with stone. They are suitable for heights up to 6.5 meters.

Uploaded by

lenana
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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stresses within its stem and base are resisted by steel reinforcement.

If the face of the wall is to be exposed


then general practice is to provide it with a small backward batter of about 1 in 50 in order to compensate
for any slight forward tilting of the wall.
Relieving platforms
A retaining wall is subjected to both shear and bending stresses caused by the lateral pressures induced
from the soil that it is supporting. A mass construction gravity wall can take such stresses in its stride but
this is not so for the vertical stem of a reinforced concrete retaining wall. If structural failure of the stem
is to be avoided then it must be provided with enough steel reinforcement to resist the bending moment
and to have a sufficient thickness to withstand the shear stresses, for all sections throughout its height.
It is this situation that imposes a practical height limitation of about 7 m on the wall stem of a conventional
retaining wall. As a wall is increased in dimensions it becomes less flexible and the lateral pressures
exerted on it by the soil will tend to be higher than the active values assumed in the design. It is possible
therefore to enter a sort of upwards spiral – if a wall is strengthened to withstand increased lateral pressures
then its rigidity is increased and the lateral pressures are increased – and so on.
A way out of the problem is the provision of one or more horizontal concrete slabs, or platforms, placed
within the backfill and rigidly connected to the wall stem. A platform carries the weight of the material
above it (up as far as the next platform if there are more than one). This vertical force exerts a cantilever
moment on to the back of the wall in the opposite direction to the bending moment caused by the lateral
soil pressure. The resulting bending moment diagram becomes a series of steps and the wall is subjected
to a maximum bending moment value that is considerably less than the value when there are no platforms
(Fig. 8.2).
With the reduction of bending moment values to a manageable level, the wall stem can be kept slim
enough for the assumption of active pressure values to be realistic, with a consequential more economical
construction.
Counterfort wall
This wall can be used for heights greater than about 6 m. Its wall stem acts as a slab spanning between
the counterfort supports which are usually spaced at about 0.67 H but not less than 2.5 m, because of
construction considerations. Details of the wall are given in Fig. 8.1b.
Fig. 8.1 Types of reinforced concrete retaining walls.
Retaining Structures 223
A form of the counterfort wall is the buttressed wall where the counterforts are built on the face of the
wall and not within the backfill. There can be occasions when such a wall is useful but, because of the
exposed buttresses, it can become unsightly and is not very popular.
8.2.3 Crib walls
Details of the wall are shown in Fig. 8.3a. It consists of a series of pens made up from prefabricated timber,
precast concrete or steel members which are filled with granular soil. It acts like a mass construction gravity
wall with the advantage of quick erection and, due to its flexible nature, the ability to withstand relatively
large differential settlements. A crib wall is usually tilted so that its face has a batter of about 1 in 6. The
width of the wall can vary from 0.5 H to 1.0 H and the wall is suitable for heights up to about 6.5 m. It is
important to note that, apart from earth fill, a crib wall should not be subjected to surcharge loadings.
8.2.4 Gabion walls
A gabion wall is built of cuboid metal cages or baskets made up from a square grid of steel fabric, usually
5 mm in diameter and spaced 75 mm apart. These baskets are usually 2 m long and 1 m 2 in cross-section,
filled with stone particles. A central diaphragm fitted in each metal basket divides it into two equal
1 m3 sections, which adds stability. During construction, the stone-filled baskets are secured together with
steel wire of 2.5 mm in diameter. The base of a gabion wall is usually about 0.5 H, and a typical wall is
illustrated in Fig. 8.3b. It is seen that a front face batter can be provided by slightly stepping back each
succeeding layer.
Fig. 8.2 Moment relief platforms.
Fig. 8.3 Crib and gabion walls.
Fill
(a) Crib wall (b) Gabion wall
Fill
224 Smith’s Elements of Soil Mechanics
8.3 Embedded walls
Embedded walls rely on the passive resistance of the soil in front of the lower part of the wall to provide
stability. Anchors or props, where incorporated, provide additional support.
8.3.1 Sheet pile walls
These walls are made up from a series of interlocking piles individually driven into the foundation soil. Most
modern sheet pile walls are made of steel but earlier walls were also made from timber or precast concrete
sections and may still be encountered. There are two main types of sheet pile walls: cantilever and anchored.
Cantilever wall
This wall is held in the ground by the active and passive pressures that act on its lower part (Fig. 8.12).
Anchored wall
This wall is fixed at its base, as is the cantilever wall, but it is also supported by a row, or two rows, of
ties or struts placed near its top (Fig. 8.15).
8.3.2 Diaphragm walls
A diaphragm wall could be classed either as a reinforced concrete wall or as a sheet pile wall but it really
merits its own classification. It consists of a vertical reinforced concrete slab fixed in position in the same
manner as a sheet pile in that the lower section is held in place by the active and passive soil pressures
that act upon it.
A diaphragm wall is constructed by a machine digging a trench in panels of limited length, filled with
bentonite slurry as the digging proceeds to the required depth. This slurry has thixotropic properties, i.e.
it forms into a gel when left undisturbed but becomes a liquid when disturbed. There is no penetration
of the slurry into clays, and in sands and silts, water from the bentonite slurry initially penetrates into the
soil and creates a virtually impervious skin of bentonite particles, only a few millimetres thick, on the sides
of the trench. The reason for the slurry is that it creates lateral pressures which act on the sides of the
short trench panel and thus prevents collapse. When excavation is complete the required steel reinforcement
is lowered into position. The trench is then filled with concrete by means of a tremie pipe, the
displaced slurry being collected for cleaning and further use.
The wall is constructed in alternating short panel lengths. When the concrete has developed sufficient
strength, the remaining intermediate panels are excavated and constructed to complete the wall. The
length of each panel is limited to the amount that the soil will arch, in a horizontal direction, to support
the ground until the concrete has been placed.
The various construction stages are shown in a simplified form in Fig. 8.4.
Fig. 8.4

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