Stress-strain studies of cantilever sheet pile walls using 2D and 3D numerical simulations

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present the results of stress-strain analyses of cantilever sheet pile walls in which structural elements consist of spaced concrete piles considering the flat strain (2D) and triple stress (3D) states for the soil mass. The results show that there are significant differences in the stress and displacement distribution obtained in the 2D and 3D analyses of the retaining walls. It was observed that the 2D analyses did not allow for a satisfactory evaluation of the influence of the distance between the structural elements of the retaining wall on the evaluated stresses, while the 3D analyses indicated that there is an increase in the confining stresses as the distance between the piles decreased, responding to the formation of the arch-effect in cohesive soils. It was also observed that the horizontal displacements obtained in the 2D analyses were greater than those in the 3D simulations, suggesting a conservative tendency in the two-dimensional approaches for the analyzed structure. In general, it was observed that 3D analyses were more suitable for evaluating the stress-strain behavior of cantilever sheet pile walls consisting of spaced concrete piles, allowing a more realistic assessment of their performance in situations where the structural elements are spaced apart.