Evaluation of settlement behaviors of the improved ground by using floating type cement-treated columns during consolidation

For soft soil engineering, in many cases, the foundation directly on natural ground cannot satisfy the requirement, such as embankment on deep soft clay layer. Consequently, a technology of combining the float-type cement-treated columns and surface stabilization is developed for reducing the settlement and the construction cost. In order to apply this technology for practice, it is important to predict the total settlement of the ground in relation to the important factors. In this paper, in order to evaluate the consolidation settlement behavious, a set of laboratory model tests were performed. Furthermore, the settlement behavior and stress distribution characteristics were investigated by image analysis. Finally, a numerical analysis which can simulate the process of consolidation settlement was performed to compare the experiment results. Based on all of the results, the tendency of consolidation settlement, the skin friction and ground improvement ratio were discussed.