Settlement Calculation of Pile Foundation With Different Shaft Resistance Models by Mean Vertical Additional Stress Coefficient Method

This study develops the mean vertical additional stress coefficient on the basis of vertical additional stress, and an analytical solution for calculating the settlement of pile foundations is derived accordingly. The method simplifies settlement calculations by simply layering the soil layers with different compression moduli, eliminating the need for redundant layering of identical soil types, and it is validated through comparisons with the layer‐wise summation method (LSM) and real project data. The study utilizes the Mindlin solution for obtaining vertical additional stress, distinguishing between stresses caused by the loads from the pile above the calculation point and the remaining other piles (ROPs) in the group based on the horizontal distance from the calculation point to the pile centerline. For the stress caused by the loads from the ROPs in the group, the effect of pile diameter can be ignored because the horizontal distance from the calculation point to the pile centerline is usually greater than three times the pile diameter. The mean vertical additional stress coefficient is defined by integrating vertical additional stress along the calculated depth of soil and averaging it in the depth direction. Additionally, the developed method is compatible with various shaft resistance models, which can be decomposed into rectangular and triangular distributions based on the principle of equal area and consistent vertices. The effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated through case studies of pile groups and raft foundations, showing enhanced computational accuracy and efficiency over the conventional LSM.