How Deep vs. How Steep: Experiment on Soil Stability of Steep Slopes for Building Foundations

Overview

Objectives/Goals The objective was to determine the depth of a foundation required to maintain stability when a structure is built on a slope. The goal was to find out how deep a tower's foundation needs to be on a 30 degree slope. Methods/Materials A model of a building was constructed on a slope using a rain gutter, bricks, potting soil, a tower of Lego building blocks and other items readily available. The building block tower used was 18 layers tall and the foundation was up to 5 layers deep at 30 degrees. This is very close to the same ratio as a 10-story building with a 3-story foundation. Results After conducting the tests, the analysis showed that there was too much movement of the 18 layer tower with only a 5 layer foundation when built on a 30 degree slope. Conclusions/Discussion A building must have strong foundation to stay standing and survive earthquakes, wind, rain and everyday use. One of the key factors in designing a foundation is the slope of the ground. This science experiment shows that a building's foundation must get deeper as the slope increases. The goal was to find out how deep a tower's foundation needs to be on a 30 degree slope. The results showed that the foundation must be greater than 30% of the exposed height.

Competition history

• CSEF 2009 Applied Mechanics & Structures · Entry J0212

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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