University of Sulaimani

College of Engineering
Civil Department

Earthwork and
Excavation
Mr. Rozhno Omer

1
23/ 02 / 2023
 Site preparation: Involves various activities
Types of Site Preparation: like demolition of old existing
construction, clearing of building sites,
Following are the types of site preparation for underground service, and wire mapping, site
construction, surveying, and layout and anti-termite
treatment before starting construction work.
Sometimes, construction site preparation
1. Soil Testing and Report Analysis requires blasting, test drilling, landfill,
2. Demolition of Old Structure levelling, earth-moving, excavating, land
3. Underground Service and Wire Mapping drainage, and other land preparation.
4. Site Surveying and Layout
5. Site Clearing
6. Site Excavation and Earthwork
7. Compaction of Construction Project Site
8. Anti-Termite Treatment
9. Start Construction Work
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 Types of Site Preparation

1: Soil Testing and 2: Demolition of Old 3: Underground Service 4: Site Surveying 5: Site Clearing:
Report Analysis: Structure: and Wire Mapping: and Layout:
● Soil testing is essential ● Is important in ● While doing construction ●Now, it is time to ●Involves removing
before planning and construction site site preparation work and layout the building any underground
designs any preparation work. If excavating in urban areas, plan and fixing the wood, underbrush,
construction project. there is any old near to telecom service, or exact position of the trees, and rocks to a
Without knowing the structure then near to railway line care building. With the distance of
properties of soil we prepare a plan to should be taking no help of survey pegs approximately three
cannot design any demolish it with the service line or or physical markers, meters from the
structure help of the demolition underground wire break a surveyor will locate building zone.
team. and disturbed due to the boundaries of
work. the new building. 3
 Types of Site Preparation

6: Site Excavation and 7: Compaction of 8: Anti-Termite 9: Start

Earthwork Construction Project Site Treatment Construction Work

● As the layout of the ● The soil at the base of the ● Is essential for building ●After all the task works
of construction site
building plan is transferred foundation must be compacted constriction. Termite may
preparation, we can now
on the ground, the to the required degree which as eat timber items and
proceed to start our main
excavation work begins and per the IBC Code is 90% of another material contains
construction activities.
the soil is removed to a maximum dry density. cellulose as their principal
Site preparation is an
required depth in which the Compaction of soil at the base food is timber. Termites
essential task needed
foundation of the structure of the foundation is essential are able to infiltrate into
specialist skills to be
is placed. because it decreases wall cavities, cracks in
carried out safely and
settlement and consequently concrete slabs, and voids
appropriately.. 4
prevents undesired incidents. in walls or floors.
 Excavation
Excavation Classification of Excavation Classification of Excavation

Excavation is the first step of Excavations are generally • Open excavations refer to
construction. It refers to the classified as: large (and often deep)
process of removing soil or excavations, such as for a
rock from its original • Open excavations basement.
location, typically in
preparation for constructing • Trenches • Trenches generally refer to
foundations, basements, and
long, narrow excavations,
underground utility lines and • Pits
such as for footings under a
for grading of the ground
wall or utility pipes.
surface.
• Pits are excavations for the
footing of an individual
column, elevator shaft, and
so on.
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 Excavation

Open excavations Trench excavations Pit excavations

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 A: Man power excavation:
• For wall footings, small trenches…
and completing the excavations made
by machines.
•  Done by simple equipment. (For
Excavation is done in two ways: clay soil)

B: Excavations using machines:

At their core, excavation projects come

•  Man power
down to a company, its personnel,
• Mechanically professionalism, and the excavation
equipment. That’s why it’s so vital to
have the right tools. In any kind of job
or project, having the right tools is
essential for success. 7
 1-Power shovel 2- Backhoe:

It is tower type. Used for excavating and loading large It looks like power shovel but the direction of
amount of soil and when the excavation is deep or excavation is from top to bottom.
when the soil is cemented gravel or compacted clay
Used in narrow excavation like wall footing,
when cannot be excavated by other machines.
trenches having vertical sides,

● High speed of construction Excavating in lower level than the level of the
machine.
● Not used in non-cohesive soil because this
machine excavates from bottom to top.
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 3-Drag line: 4- Clam shell:

Tower type, used for excavating and loading loose It is also tower type. Used for removing soil
soil (saturated with water). Needs a large area for vertically.
turning.
Used as an assistance machine. (It means that
excavating is done by other machines and
Good capacity for loading but less than "Power
removal of soil is done by "clam shell“).
shovel" usually used in cleaning rivers and drains.
It is a low output machine and is preferred in
laces which contains so many underground
services.
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 5-tractor shovel: 6- Grader: 7-Rock excavation:
Used for small excavation works & Used for laying of soil and Using "Jack hammers" or
loadings and, gravel &soil. It has two
types: crushed stone and for explorers.
levelling and gradation of
Tooth type end
surfaces, used in roads and
Plain type end airports.

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 8-Buldozer: 9-Scraper:

Used for large earth works. Equipped with blade. • Is capable of excavating, hauling & dumping
moves earth by lowering the blade& cutting until a
full blade load of material is obtained. material over medium.
• To long haul distances.
Then pushes the material across the ground surface
to the required location. (Can not be used for soil
• Used in large works as in roads & bridges.
loading.) • Used for cutting and filling along the line of
work.
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 The failure of soil cut arises when the limit of
excavation exceeds its safe height limit and it
depends upon unconfined compressive
Excavation Supports strength of soil and cohesion. Following table
provides the safe height limit for different soil
types based on their unconfined compressive
strength and cohesion limits.
In general, to construct a structure, excavation of soil is
necessary. But when deep cuts are made in soil, the soil Unconfined
Soil type compressive Cohesion (psf) Safe height (ft)
from the sides of excavated area may collapse due to low strength (psf)

stability. To prevent this and to make t he cut accurate Very soft Less than 500 <250 <5

Soft 500-1000 250-500 5-10

vertical we need some temporary earth retaining structures
Medium 1000-2000 500-1000 10-20
called excavation supports.
Stiff 2000-4000 1000-2000 20-40

Very stiff 4000-8000 2000-4000 40-80

Hard >8000 >4000 >80 12

 1: Sheet piles
2: Cantilevered soldier piles
3: Anchored soldier piles
4: Contiguous bored concrete piles
Types of Excavation Supports 5: Secant piles
6: Soil nailing
7:Bentonite slurry walls
Some of the commonly used methods of supporting deep
vertical cuts in the soil are:

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 Uses of sheet piling:

• When construction is taking place in a confined

space, then temporary walls are used to prevent
cave-ins; offering protection to the workers working
in the vicinity of the area.
• In a home environment, sheet piling is used as
Sheet piles
permanent walls as they provide stability and
durability to the interior walls (especially basement
Sheet piles: Are sections of sheet steel with
interlocking edges that are driven into the ground walls).
to provide permanent or temporary earth • Pilling is also used to prevent floods to structures
retention and excavation support.
close to shorelines.
For depths of up to about 15 ft, vertical sheets of • To protect foundations from water damage.
steel, referred to as sheet piles, can be driven • To support excavations for parking structures,
into the ground before commencing excavations.
basements, foundations, pump houses, and to
construct cofferdams, seawalls and bulkheads.
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 Advantages to Sheet Piles: Disadvantages to Sheet Piles:
● Sheet piles are recyclable and reusable.
● Piles can come in a wide range of lengths, size, and steel ● If the soil is rocky or has large boulders, it becomes
options. difficult to installs sheets into it.

● They can be used for temporary and permanent structures. ● If you are going to use vibratory hammers or impact
● They can be installed using silent and vibration-free hammers to install the sheets into the ground, this can

methods. cause neighbourhood disturbance.

● Sheet piling is a more cost effective and quicker installation ● Most of the sheets are used as temporary structures.
than contiguous or secant walls. After the project is completed, the sheets are

● Sheet piles can provide a close-fitting joint to form an removed, which can be costly.
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effective water seal.
 Cantilevered soldier piles
H-shaped steel columns (called soldier piles or H-piles ) are placed in the ground. The piles are placed in
predrilled circular holes approximately 6 to 8 ft on centre.

The ground is excavated in vertical segments 5 to 6 ft in height that expose the encased piles. Part of the
concrete encasing the piles is now scraped to make way for the welded wire reinforcement (WWR) placed
between the flanges of adjacent H-piles.

After the WWR is placed, concrete is sprayed over the reinforcement under high velocity and pressure
(referred to as shotcrete or gunite ). 16
 • The channels are connected together with
steel plates welded at intervals in this
space.

• Drilling for tieback anchors is done through

the space between the twin C-sections of
piles.
Anchored soldier piles
• The use of a cantilevered soldier pile system is uneconomical • After a tieback hole has been drilled, steel

beyond a depth of approximately 15 ft because of the increase bars or high-strength steel tendons are

in pile cross section. placed in the hole, and the hole is grouted.

• For deeper excavations, an anchored soldier pile system is • The earth retention between the anchored
piles can be provided by shotcrete over
employed, which is similar to the cantilevered pile system
WWR,.
except that the piles are tied back (anchored) into the ground.
The commonly used vertical support members for this system
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consist of two steel channels with a space between them.
 Contiguous bored concrete piles Secant piles
● In situations where the (deep) excavation is close to an
●A major shortcoming of CBPs is the gaps between
adjacent building or the property line, tiebacks cannot be
piles and the consequent lack of water resistance of
used. In this situation, closely spaced reinforced concrete
the excavation support. This problem is overcome by
piles, called contiguous bored piles (CBPs), are often used.
the use of the modified version of CBPs called secant
● Each pile is made by screwing an auger into the ground.
piles .
The auger, called a continuous flight auger , has a hollow
● Secant piles essentially consist of two sets of
stem in the middle of a continuous spiral drill.
interlocking contiguous piles. The first set, called the
● CBPs up to 100 ft deep have been constructed. They are primary piles, is bored and concreted in the same way
generally 18 to 36 in. in diameter, depending on the depth
as the CBPs. 18
of the excavation.
 Bentonite slurry walls ( as trench support)

● Commonly used in situations where the

underground water table is relatively high,
is a reinforced concrete wall.

● Construction of such walls is done by

Soil nailing excavating 10-ft- to 15-ft-long

● Soil nailing is a means of strengthening the soil discontinuous trench sections down to

with closely spaced, inclined steel bars that bedrock, called primary panels. So that

increase the cohesiveness of the soil and the soil does not collapse, the trench is

prevent the soil from shearing along an inclined continuously kept filled with bentonite

plane. slurry as the excavation proceeds.

● The inclined bars are almost perpendicular to

the possible shearing plane. In other words, the ● Bentonite slurry is a mixture of water and
steel bars connect imaginary inclined layers of bentonite clay, which pressurizes the walls

the earth into a thick block that behaves as a of the trench sufficiently to prevent their

gravity-retaining wall when excavated. collapse during excavation.) 19

 We’re registered at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxfblDRB398
… Make sure you create a safe working environment

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