Efficiency of Dimensional Analysis in Predicting Compression Load–Settlement Relationship of Soft Clay Under a Rigid Foundation

Abstract

Dimensional analysis is an effective tool for designing laboratory tests, and it is also a successful method to reasonably predict the results of large-scale or field tests, which are difficult and costly to perform, by considering the outcomes obtained from small-scale tests. This paper therefore focuses on predicting the compression load–settlement relationship of soft clay soil under a rigid foundation by dimensional analysis. For that purpose, a series of dimensionless pi (π) terms were first produced for the relevant problem by employing Buckingham’s pi (π) theorem via the MATLAB program. Secondly, the results of a small-scale physical test reported in the literature that investigated the load–settlement relationship of soft clay soil under a rigid foundation subjected to compression load were verified with the finite element method. Thereafter, the small-scale problem was scaled up several times using dimensionless terms, and the compression load–settlement relationship for the large-scale cases was investigated with both dimensional analysis and the validated finite element method. The findings indicate that dimensional analysis produces reasonably successful outcomes considering the computational ease. In addition, the MATLAB program presented in this paper is quite useful for those desiring to determine the dimensionless terms belonging to any sort of problem.