Simplification analysis of suction pile using two dimensions finite element modeling

Abstract

This paper presents the results of parametric analyses to compute the axial capacity of a suction pile using 2D and 3D finite element approaches. The study is intended to simplify the process of analyzing suction piles from 3D to 2D model. The research focuses on obtaining the coefficient to be applied into the 2D model in order to obtain results that are as close as possible to the 3D model. Two 2D models were used in the analysis, namely the plane strain and axisymmetric models. The analyses were performed using two actual offshore soil data of the North and West Java Indonesia. The study reveals that the simplification of model through 2D Finite Element is achievable by applying the appropriate coefficient to the stiffness parameters. The results show that the simplified model of the 2D FEA provides more conservative results (with the difference between 2% to 7%) than the 3D FEA.