What are pile driving methods?

Pile foundations are deeper frameworks that are used where the site is somewhat weak and has shallow bearing stratification making it necessary to pass load to a more profound stratum either by means of friction or end bearing principles. Foundations protect structures by shifting the weight to the rock or soil layers having adequate bearing ability and right establishment properties. There are a wide variety of foundation types available that are fitting for diverse applications.

The pile foundation techniques and the deployment procedures are the factors that are just as crucial as the designing process. The Pile foundation installation methods include:

  • Pile hammer
  • Boring by a mechanical drill

Experienced and competent Piling Contractors in London ‌advice to choose the tools and construction equipment very carefully to prevent any damage to the piles in the designing phase

Displacement pile driving methods 

  1. Dropping weight
  2. Vibration
  3. Jetting

Non-Displacement pile driving methods 

  1. Continuous Flight Auger (CFA)
  2. Underreaming

Drop Hammer Method of Pile Driving

A hammer of roughly the mass of a pile is lifted in a guide to an appropriate elevation and released to hit the top end of the pile. This is a basic form of hammer used in tandem with light blocks and sample piling, where bringing a steam boiler or compressor to a construction site could be an expensive affair to drive a fairly restricted number of piles.

There are two major types of drop hammers:

  • Single-acting steam or compressed-air pile hammers
  • Double-acting pile hammers

A single-acting team or compressed-air in the shape of a cylinder contains a huge mass, which disengages the piston rod. The steam is cut off at the peak of the motion, or at a lower height which the Piling Contractors ‌can easily regulate, and the cylinder drops freely on the pile head.

The hammers of double-acting piles can be powered by steam or compressed air. With this sort of hammer, a piling framework is not needed and can instead be connected by leg-guides to the top of the pile-driven by a wooden frame. When employed with a pile framing, rear guides are bolted to the hammer to interlock with heads, and only short leg-guides are utilized to block the hammer from shifting to the position relative to the top of the pile. Double-acting hammers are primarily employed for sheet pile driving.

Pile Driving by Vibration

Typically, vibratory hammers are either electrically driven or hydraulically operated and comprise of coaxial contra-rotating unconventional parts within a covering attached to the head of the pile.

The amplitude of the fluctuation on the sides of the pile is enough to break down the surface friction. Piling Contractors ‌recommend the land bearing sandy or gravelly soil as the best candidate for deploying vibrational pile driving methods.

Jetting

Water jetting can be used to assist the infiltration of piles into sediment or gravel-filled soil. The method has, however, very limited success against stiff clays or any land that contains a lot of coarse gravel, cobbles, or pebbles.

Boring Method

Continuous Flight

Auger (CFA)Here, the machinery consists of a mobile foundation carrier configured with a hollow-stemmed flight drill that is shuffled in the soil to the needed piling depth. Concrete is poured through the flight auger to build the pile, as it is removed from the ground.

The auger is equipped with a shielding cover at the exit on the foot of the central conduit and is wheeled to the ground by the top-mounted rotatory hydraulic motor operating on a mast-mounted carrier.

Highly functional concrete is injected through the void stem of the auger; upon hitting the required depth, the protective lid gets automatically disengaged under pressure from the filling concrete. While pivoting the drill in the corresponding direction as during the boring stage, the soil is ousted vertically. Finally, the auger is removed, and the pile is formed by packing with concrete.

Skilled contractors ‌opine that it is necessary to align with the movement of the auger and concrete pouring motion to prevent the breakdown of the sides of the concrete hole, especially during the lower drill flight, which might lead to voids in concrete, stuffed with soil.

The method is particularly effective on wet and soft soils and allows the installation of a number of bored piles of varying diameters which can infiltrate a myriad of ground conditions.

Underreaming

Underreaming is a unique feature of auger bored piles which is sometimes used by offering an expanded base to leverage the load-carrying capacity of appropriate strata. In order to use this technique, the soil must be able to stand upright in the open and on its own— Rigid and harder clays, such as the ones found in London are the best candidates.

The Underreaming device is mounted inside the straight section of a pile shaft in its locked state and then enlarged at the bottom of the pile to create the under ream.

What are pile driving methods?

What are pile driving methods?
Hammer mounted Piling rig being used to drive pile at construction site

Pile driving is a method used to drive piles into the soil, to provide foundation support for buildings and structures. Piles can be fabricated from concrete, timber, or steel. The piles act as a structural member to transfer the load of the structure to a required depth in deep foundations. Driving piles allows a structure to be placed in an area that would otherwise be unsuitable given the subsurface conditions. There are different types of equipment used for pile driving in construction each of the types, the features and applications are discussed below.

Pile driving equipments and their uses

Piling rigs

Piling rigs are mainly used to drill/create piles in soil, clay, etc. It is widely used for cast-in-place piles, diaphragm walls, and foundation reinforcement. It consists of a tabular element or hard box, placed and fixed on a crane base. Piling rigs in India come with different features that can be utilized to dig within the earth’s subsurface, making of the water wells, oil wells or natural gas extraction wells, or to install sub-surface fabrications. It is designed for multipurpose use and can be equipped with special kits for different foundation and geotechnical construction methods including, drilled shafts, caissons, continuous flight auger, diaphragm walls, etc. The features include;

  • Integrated with mechanical, electrical and hydraulic systems
  • Comes with 360⁰ camera rearview for operator efficiency
  • Emergency stopping of machine possible
  • Attached with Boom micro-switch for control of the stability limit
  • Double-rotary interlocking kelly bars for transfer of torque and crowd force from the rotary drive to the drilling tool
  • Interlocking bars with the higher pulling force for the tougher terrain
  • Interlocking kelly bars for pulling up during the extraction phase with the main winch and the rotary
  • Comes with a parallelogram for precise positioning
What are pile driving methods?
MAIT HR 180 Piling Rig Machine

Rotary Drilling Rig

Rotary Drilling Rig uses a sharp, rotating drill bit and downward pressure to cut or crush, through the subsurface. Impact energy is supplied to the drill bit from either an above-ground or down-hole impact hammer. This impact force aids in the drilling. They can be used in deeper depths and are capable of larger diameter holes. Its feature include;

  • Both the counterweight and the leader are modularly constructed
  • The control system comes with program and control options for various drilling methods
  • Can be equipped with a shortened leader system which is perfect for construction sites with height limitations
  • Kelly bar is made of high strength steel tubes with light design
  • Interlocking kelly bar is offer higher torque output and maximum pile depth
  • Comes with special drilling attachment for anti-seismic piles
  • Tailored chassis with larger spaces for pumps and valves is for easy maintenance
  • Equipped with a modern air-conditioning system with improved airflow for operator
  • An optimized field of vision and increased noise protection for the operator
What are pile driving methods?
Sany SR235-W10 Rotary Drilling Rig

Hydraulic impact pile hammer

Hydraulic impact pile hammers are suitable for driving steel tube pipes, sheet piles, precast concrete and timber piles. The stroke and blow rates are adjustable to optimize the pile driving performance in all conditions. The ram weight can also be changed according to pile type requirements. All this means that one hammer serves efficiently a wide range of different pile driving operations. The hammers can be mounted on all kinds of pilling leaders or can be freely suspended. It is suitable to be used as a leader mounted on piling rigs and piling cranes as well as crane suspended. Different features of this machine utilized for Indian terrain includes;

  • Adjustable hammer impact stroke
  • Smoothly adjustable impact frequency
  • Easy to connect to different hydraulic systems
  • Modular ram block design
  • Drive caps are available for all types and sizes of piles.
  • Double-acting hammers provide high work rates
What are pile driving methods?
Gmmco India- Junttan HHK S series Hydraulic Impact Pile Hammer

Vibratory pile hammer

A vibratory hammer is used to drive sheet piles, pipes or other elements into the soil by vertical vibrations. The adjacent soil particles are put into motion and thus the soil is ‘loosened’. The dynamic weight of the hammer drives the elements into the soil. Apart from driving and extracting elements such as sheet piles and pipes, vibratory hammers are also used for soil densifying or vertical drainage across multiple projects in India. Its features include;

  • Variable frequency, weight and line pull for job matching
  • Attached with hammer brake to minimize boom shake
  • High efficiency, bent axis, piston motors
  • Open-loop hydraulics for efficiency and reliability
  • Rotating gears with 360° feature
  • Internal clamp comes with check valve from damage protection
  • Easy handling and easy adjustment of clamping devices
What are pile driving methods?
Vibro Hammer OVR 80 S

Piling winches

Piling winch is widely used in the construction site, mine and port to hoist the object vertically. This kind of hand control high-speed free rolling winch can be used especially in the free fall punching piling operation in the bridge, dock and infrastructure construction project. It has a special feature that the piling winch is the main shaft rotating which is known as the rotating shaft. It comes with added attachments like Sludge Pumps, Casing of all sizes & all types, Tripods, Chisels, Trimmie Hoppers etc. Piling winches in India comes with features, such as,

  • High and stable operational efficiency
  • Attached with configurations of Single, Double and Triple drum
  • Equipped with cone clutch for trouble-free operation and a carbon steel shaft
  • Made of high-quality raw materials & are available in various specifications like 5T, 7.5T & 10T
  • Main shaft rotating
  • Available in 2.5 tone, 5 tone and 7.5 tonne capacity
What are pile driving methods?
Metalix Engineering’s Piling Winch Machine

Conclusion

Each of the equipment types is discussed above but the type of pile driving equipment used often varies according to conditions ranging from soil consistency to depth of piles required. The pile driving equipment market in India is driven by infrastructure projects undertaken by the government and other commercial construction projects. With the advent of rapid industrialization and modernization in operational processes, digital technologies play a crucial role. The companies are more inclined to offer digitally advanced piling equipment suited to the Indian terrain to the customers to gain a competitive edge in the market.