Civil Engineering PE Shallow and Deep Foundations 4

Question 1

A 2.5-ft wide strip footing is founded 3 ft below grade in clay with Su = 800 psf.
Using Hansen's bearing capacity factors (Nc = 5.14, sc = 1.0 for strip), the gross ultimate bearing capacity is approximately:

Accepted Answer

4,112 psf + overburden

Answer

5,140 psf + overburden

Answer

3,600 psf + overburden

Answer

6,200 psf + overburden

Question 2

The wave equation analysis (WEAP) for driven piles is used primarily to:

Accepted Answer

Predict driving resistance and evaluate hammer-pile-soil system performance during installation

Answer

Calculate long-term consolidation settlement under pile loads

Answer

Design the pile cap reinforcement for punching shear

Answer

Determine lateral pile stiffness using p-y curves

Question 3

For a rectangular footing with dimensions B × L, the Meyerhof shape factor for the cohesion term (sc) is:

Accepted Answer

1 + 0.2(B/L)Kp

Answer

1 + (B/L)tan(φ)

Answer

1 + 0.4(B/L)

Answer

1 + 0.3(B/L)

Question 4

An H-pile driven to rock refusal develops its load primarily through:

Accepted Answer

End bearing at the pile tip with minimal skin friction contribution

Answer

Skin friction along the full pile length

Answer

A combination of 50% skin friction and 50% end bearing by code

Answer

Lateral earth pressure on the flanges

Question 5

The Davisson offset limit method for determining pile capacity from a static load test uses an offset of:

Accepted Answer

0.15 in + pile diameter/120

Answer

0.25 in + pile length/200

Answer

1% of pile diameter

Answer

0.5 in fixed offset for all pile sizes

Question 6

Immediate settlement of a footing on saturated clay under undrained loading is calculated using:

Accepted Answer

Elastic theory with undrained modulus Eu and Poisson's ratio νu = 0.5

Answer

Terzaghi's 1-D consolidation equation with Cv

Answer

The stress distribution method with Cc and e0

Answer

SPT-based empirical correlations with N60

Question 7

When eccentricity of loading on a footing exceeds B/6, the pressure distribution beneath the footing:

Accepted Answer

Develops tensile stress on one side, meaning only part of the footing is in contact with soil

Answer

Remains uniform but shifts toward the load resultant

Answer

Causes immediate punching shear failure by code definition

Answer

Is ignored and replaced with a uniform pressure