Chapter 19

Piles and Pile-Driving

Equipment
Copyright The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.

PILES

CLASSIFICATION
OF PILES
Piles can be classified on the basis
of either their use or the materials
from which they are made. On the
basis of use, there are two major
classifications: (1) sheet and (2) load
bearing.

SHEET PILES
Sheet piles are used primarily to
create a rigid barrier for earth
and water. Typical uses include
cutoff walls under dams, and for
cofferdams, bulkheads, and
trenching.

SHEET
PILES

LOADBEARING
PILES
Load-bearing piles, as the name
implies, are used primarily to
transmit structural loads.

D G
A N
I
LO R S
E
A
E L
B PI

PILE TYPES
Timber
Treated with a preservative
Untreated
Concrete
Precast-prestressed
Cast-in-place with shells
Augered cast-in-place

PILE TYPES
Steel
H section
Steel pipe
Composite
Concrete and steel
Plastic with steel pipe core

TIMBER
PILES
Timber piles are made
from the trunks of trees.
Such piles are available
in most sections of the
country and the world.
Ordinary lengths are 15
to 45 ft.

CONCRETE
PILES

Concrete piles may be either

precast or cast-in-place.

STEEL
PILES
Load-bearing steel piles can be Hsections, hollow box or tubular
sections, or pipes.

COMPOSITE
PILES
Several types of composite piles are
available. These are usually
developed and offered to meet the
demands of special situations. Two of
the most common situations that
cause problems, when conventional
piles are used, are hard driving
conditions and warm marine
environments.

DRIVING
PILES
Crawler crane
w/single acting
air hammer and
hydraulic leads.
Driving 12-in.
concrete piles.

DRIVING PILES
The forces that enable a pile to
support a load also cause the pile
to resist the efforts made to drive
it. The total resistance of a pile
to penetration will equal the sum
of the forces produced by skin
friction and end bearing.

DRIVING PILES
Depending on the size of the
project, one or more of the
test piles would be selected
for load testing.

LOAD TEST
Reaction frame
and hydraulic
jacks used to
load test a 54-in.
concrete
cylinder pile.

PILE
HAMMERS
Variable subsurface conditions
can dictate the use of different
pile hammers. The function of
a pile hammer is to furnish the
energy required to drive a pile.

PILE HAMMERS
1. Drop
2. Single-acting steam or
compressed air
3. Double-acting steam or
compressed air
4. Differential-acting steam or
compressed air

PILE HAMMERS
5. Diesel
6. Hydraulic
drivers

impact and

7. Vibratory drivers

DROP
HAMMERS

A drop hammer is a heavy metal

weight that is lifted by a hoist line,
then released and allowed to fall
onto the top of the pile. Because of
the high dynamic forces, a pile cap
is positioned between the hammer
and the pile head.

SINGLE-ACTING
HAMMERS
These hammers rely solely on
gravity acting on the striking
weight to achieve their driving
energy. The a freely falling
weight, called a ram, that is
lifted by steam or compressed air.

DOUBLEACTING
HAMMERS
With double-acting hammers, the
striking ram is driven by compressed
air or steam both when rising and when
falling. Thus, with a given weight of
ram, it is possible to attain a desired
amount of energy per blow with a
shorter stroke than with a longer singleacting hammer.

DIFFERENTIALACTING
HAMMERS

A differential-acting air is a
modified single-acting hammer in
that the air or steam pressure used
to lift the ram is not exhausted at
the end of the upward stroke but is
valved over the piston to accelerate
the ram on the downstroke.

DIESEL
HAMMERS
A diesel piledriving
hammer is a selfcontained driving unit
that does not require an
external source of energy
such as an air
compressor or steam
boiler.

DIESEL
HAMMERS

The downstroke of the ram

compresses air and fuel to
ignition heat and the resulting
explosion drives the pile
downward and the ram upward
to repeat its stroke.

DIESEL
HAMMERS
Diesel hammers
impart
compression,
impact and
explosion energy
to the pile.

DIESEL
HAMMERS
1. Raise the
piston to start.
2. Injection of
diesel fuel and
compression.
3. Impact and
explosion.

4
5

DIESEL
HAMMERS
4. Exhaust ports
exposed and gases
escape.
5. Draws fresh air
through the
exhaust ports.

DIESEL HAMMERS
Fuel usage varies with the size
of the hammer see Table 19.4 .
DELMAG

10,500 ft-lb
58,248 ft-lb
107,177 ft-lb
300,000 ft-lb

0.7 gal/hr
2.11 gal/hr
4.23 gal/hr
7.93 gal/hr

HYDRAULIC IMPACT
HAMMERS
There is a trend toward the use of
hydraulic hammers. A hydraulic
hammer operates on the
differential pressure of hydraulic
fluid instead of compressed air or
steam.

HAMMER SPECS

HAMMER SPECS

VIBRATORY
PILE DRIVERS
Vibratory pile drivers
are especially effective
when the piles are driven
into water-saturated
noncohesive soils.

VIBRATORY
HAMMERS
Vibratory
hammers use
exciting shafts
rotating in
opposite
directions.

VI
BR
H
A M AT
O
M R
ER Y

VIBRATORY
HAMMER
Can be driven
by hydraulic
or electric
motors.

POSITIONING PILES
DURING DRIVING
When driving piles, it is necessary
to have a method that will position
the pile in the proper location with
the required alignment or batter
and that will support the pile
during driving.

PILE LEADS
Forward
Batter
Vertical

Aft
Batter

POSITIONING PILES
DURING DRIVING
Fixed leads have a pivot point at the
cranes boom top and a brace at their
bottom that attaches to the crane.
Fixed leads offer good control of the
pile position and keep the pile in correct
alignment with the hammer so that
eccentric impacts are minimized.

FIXED
LEADS

FIXED
LEADS

POSITIONING PILES
DURING DRIVING
Leads that are not attached at
their bottom to the crane or
driving platform are known as
swing leads. The leads and
hammer are usually held by
separate lines from the crane.

SWING
LEADS
Steam hammer
used to drive 54-in.
concrete cylinder
piles, with swing
leads.

PILE LEADS
Stabbing points at the end of
a set of leads.

POSITIONING PILES
DURING DRIVING
Many times a template is used to
support and hold the pile in the proper
position during driving. Templates are
usually constructed from steel pipe or
beams and may have several levels of
framing to support long piles or piles
on a batter.

TEMPLATE
Floating rig
driving
concrete
piles using a
template.

TEMPLATE
Three 8 ft
diameter steel
cylinder piles
standing in the
template on a
batter ready
for driving.

HANDLING
PILES
Care must be
exercised to
prevent damage
to the pile from
flexural stresses.

POINTERS
For concrete piles the weight of the
hammer ram should be one third
the pile weight.
Easy to start a pile with an air
hammer.
Diesel hammers will not start when
the pile is in soft material.

POINTERS

Position the
crane so it
can reach
the driving
position and
the piles
with out
traveling.

POINTERS
Driving time:
45 to 50 ft piles normally
can be driven in 5 - 10 min.
But in hard material it can
take 4 hr.

PILE-DRIVING
SAFETY