Experimental study and numerical modelling on the performance of circular footing resting on geogrid—reinforced granular soil bed

In the recent decade, the use of geogrid to improve the settlement behaviour of granular soil has become a major topic. So, applying geogrid for shallow foundation soil reinforcement is an important technique for improving the granular loose sand soil. In this study, the performance of a circular footing based on a reinforced granular soil bed was evaluated using comprehensive experimental work on thirteen (13) soil models. Comparison between reinforced and unreinforced condition under circular footing was carried. The depth of geogrid and the number of layers under circular footings was chosen as the various parameters in this study. The results revealed that, the soil's bearing capacity increase with 15.29%, 23.61%, 36.78%, and 42.14% using one, two, three, and four geogrid layers at (u/B) of 0.5, respectively. At (u/B = 0.8), sand's load-carrying capacity improves by 11.15%, 17.76%, 30.66%, and 38.55% for one, two, three, four layer of reinforcement using Geogrid, respectively. For one, two, three, four layer of reinforcement using Geogrid at (u/B = 1.0), the load carrying capacity of sand increases by 8.53%, 12.38%, 22.88% and 32.43%, respectively. In addition, to model and verify the experimental models, and to check the validity of the chosen computational processes, both a 2-D Finite Element Program GeoStudio 2018 and PLAXIS (2D) software were used. The results show that PLAXIS (2D) and GeoStudio 2018 can be used to simulate the settlement of loose sand soil under circular footing. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.