DYNAMIC ELASTIC ANALYSIS OF PILE FOUNDATIONS USING FINITE-ELEMENT METHOD IN THE FREQUENCY-DOMAIN

A quasi-three-dimensional finite element method of analysis is propose d for the dynamic response analysis of pile foundations that is comput ationally feasible for practical applications. The method uses a simpl ified three-dimensional wave equation for describing the dynamic respo nse of the soil. The response of the pile foundation is computed direc tly without having to use pile-soil-pile interaction factors. The quas i-three-dimensional solution greatly reduces the computational time fo r the direct analysis of pile groups. The method is presented here for an elastic response so that it can be validated against existing more exact elastic solutions and low-amplitude field vibration tests. The method is extended to nonlinear dynamic response analysis in an accomp anying paper.