Design, build and test a pile in one place. Analyse it laterally by the standard p-y method — a beam-column on nonlinear p-y springs for clays, sands, liquefied sand and weak rock, with free, fixed or restrained heads, P-Δ, cracked stiffness, group effects, pushover and the pile-head stiffness matrix — and axially with α, β and rock-socket capacity, the AS 2159 reduction factor and a t-z load–settlement curve. Design the section (interaction diagram, moment–curvature, shear, buckling, handling) for bored, CFA, precast, prestressed spun hollow-core, steel tube and H, timber, screw and micropiles; watch each one being built step by step with its hold points; then test it — PIT, CSL, thermal integrity, wave equation, PDA with signal matching, and static, tension, lateral, bi-directional, rapid and instrumented load tests — and design the load test set-up with its reaction beams and jacks.
Scope & limitations
Preliminary engineering tool: correlations, p-y and t-z curves are published defaults. Calibrate against site-specific load tests and check designs against AS 2159, AS 3600 and AS 4100. The sample project and all test records are synthetic.
What the pile studio does
Summary & checks opens the studio: every design check with its utilisation and a link to the section that calculates it, quick editing of the loads, serviceability limits and the workflow. Undo and redo (Ctrl+Z / Ctrl+Y) and Save / Open project files sit in the top bar, and each section starts with a one-line guide.
3D finite element: the pile and the layered ground are meshed with 8-node bricks (incompatible modes, half model on the symmetry plane) and solved in the browser — linear elastic or hyperbolic nonlinear soil, free or fixed head — giving deflection, settlement, bending moment and axial force down the pile, the displacement field as a section and a 3D view, and the pile-head stiffness of the continuum next to the p-y and elastic (Randolph) values. Spring analysis: the 6 × 6 pile-head stiffness matrix from the elastic continuum, the p-y / t-z secant or the FE model, a Winkler spring model (p-y secant, Vesic, continuum-matched or user k) analysed in 3D under Hx, Hy, P, Mx, My and torque with P-Δ, export of the springs to CSV or the 3D Frame Studio, and a six-degree-of-freedom group analysis of the rigid cap on pile springs with raked piles, fixed or pinned heads and pile–pile interaction.
Lateral analysis follows the p-y approach: the pile is a beam-column on nonlinear Winkler springs with p-y curves for soft clay (Matlock), stiff clay with and without free water (Reese, Welch & Reese), sand (API / Reese), liquefied sand (Rollins) and weak rock (Reese), free, fixed, rotationally restrained or displaced heads, P-Δ, cracked EI from moment–curvature, group p-multipliers, pushover, length sensitivity and the pile-head stiffness matrix. Axial capacity uses α, β, O'Neill & Reese, API and rock-socket methods with the AS 2159 reduction factor, and the load–settlement curve comes from API t-z and q-z springs.
Every pile type is covered — bored, CFA, precast, prestressed spun hollow-core (PHC), steel tube and H, timber, screw and micropiles — with structural design (AS 3600 interaction, AS 4100 steel, shear, buckling with depth of fixity, handling and lifting) and an animated, to-scale construction sequence with the hold points at each step. Testing includes low-strain PIT with mobility, cross-hole sonic logging with tomography, thermal integrity profiling, wave-equation drivability, PDA Case method and signal matching, static compression, tension, lateral, bi-directional, rapid and instrumented load tests with their interpretation, and the design of the load test set-up: reaction piles, kentledge or anchors, reaction beams, jacks and bearing plates.
Pile groups and pile caps of any shape: start from a 2- to 9-pile template, a ring of piles under a round cap or an L-shaped cap, then move, add or remove piles and draw your own cap outline. Pile loads come from rigid-cap equilibrium under N*, Mx*, My* and the cap weight; the group is checked for pile capacity, uplift, lateral load, spacing, edge distance, efficiency, block failure in clay and settlement, and the cap is designed to AS 3600 for bending at the column faces, one-way shear and punching around the column and the most heavily loaded pile, with plan and section drawings and an auto-sized thickness.
nonlinear p-y analysis with nine p-y models and nonlinear EI
Construction sequences, site records, integrity and dynamic testing
Load test interpretation (Davisson, Chin, Brinch Hansen, Décourt) and set-up design to AS 4100