Yu, L. et al. (2011). Géotechnique 61, No. 3, 235–246 [doi: 10.1680/geot.8.P.
071]
Numerical study on plate anchor stability in clay
L . Y U
, J. L I U † , X . - J. KO N G † a n d Y. H U ‡
Although the pullout capacity of plate anchors in clay
has been studied extensively, the results considering the
coupling effects of anchor inclination, clay non-homo-
geneity and self-weight are relatively rare. In the present
paper, finite-element analyses are carried out to investi-
gate the coupling effects of these factors on the pullout
capacity of strip plate anchors in clay. The numerical
solutions are presented in the familiar form of pullout
capacity factors based on various anchor embedment
depth, clay strength profile and clay self weight, and are
also compared with existing numerical and empirical
solutions. A design procedure based on the data-fitting
equations of the present finite-element solutions is also
presented for the convenience of design engineers.
KEYWORDS: anchors; bearing capacity; clays; offshore en-
gineering
INTRODUCTION
The design of many engineering structures requires the
foundation system to resist pullout forces. These types of
structures, such as transmission towers and earth-retaining
walls, are commonly supported by soil anchors. More
recently, plate anchors have been used widely in offshore
oil/gas exploration to provide a simple and economical
foundation for mooring systems of offshore floating facilities
(Merifield et al., 2001).
Over the past four decades, considerable attention has
been paid to the pullout resistance of plate anchors under
monotonic loading conditions. Based on small-scale model
tests under 1g conditions, Das and co-workers (Das, 1980;
Das et al., 1985a; Das et al., 1985b; Das & Puri, 1989)
suggested procedures to estimate the ultimate pullout capa-
city of anchors in clay. However, the small-scale 1g condi-
tion cannot take into account the effect of in situ overburden
pressure. To include the effect of overburden pressure, Rowe
& Davis (1982) carried out a finite-element (FE) study of
anchors embedded in clay with both immediate breakaway
and no breakaway interface between the anchor and the clay
underneath. Ultimate anchor capacity was not achieved in
their FE analyses. Instead, truncated capacities using elastic
reasoning were reported. To investigate the effects of over-
burden stress, anchor shape and anchor inclined pullout,
Merifield and co-workers (Merifield et al., 2001; Merifield et
Manuscript received 19 May 2008; revised manuscript accepted 2
February 2010. Published online ahead of print 31 August 2010.
Discussion on this paper closes on 1 August 2011, for further
details see p. ii.

State Key Laboratory of Coastal and Offshore Engineering,
Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, People’s Republic of
China. Currently at the Centre for Offshore Foundation Systems,
University of Western Australia, Crawley, Western Australia.
† State Key Laboratory of Coastal and Offshore Engineering,
Dalian University of Technology, Dalian, People’s Republic of
China.
‡ School of Civil and Resource Engineering, University of Western
Australia, Crawley, Western Australia.
235
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Bien que la capacité d’arrachement des plaques d’anc-
rage dans l’argile ait été l’objet d’un grand nombre
d’études, les résultats relatifs aux effets d’accouplement
de l’inclinaison de l’ancrage, de la non homogénéité de
l’argile et du poids propre sont relativement rares. Dans
la présente communication, on effectue une analyse aux
éléments finis pour examiner les effets de l’accouplement
de ces facteurs sur la capacité d’arrachement des plaques
d’ancrage dans l’argile. Les solutions numériques sont
présentées sous la forme familière de facteurs de capacité
d’arrachement basés sur différentes caractéristiques de
profondeur d’encastrement de l’ancrage, du profil de
résistance de l’argile et du poids propre de l’argile, et
sont comparées avec les solutions numériques et empiri-
ques existantes. Une procédure d’étude, basée sur les
équations basées sur les données des solutions aux élé-
ments finis actuelles, est également présentée, à l’inten-
tion des ingénieurs concepteurs.
al., 2003; Merifield et al., 2005) presented upper and lower
bound solutions of anchor pullout capacity using FE limit
analysis. The effects of anchor embedment depth, anchor
inclination, clay unit weight, clay shear strength non-homo-
geneity and anchor shape on the pullout capacity factor have
been studied. In addition, other researchers also investigated
the pullout capacity of plate anchors in some particular
situations (Martin & Randolph, 2001; Wang, 2001; Thorne
et al., 2004; Liu et al., 2006; Wang et al., 2006; Yu et al.,
2007).
DESIGN PROCEDURES IN THE PREVIOUS STUDIES
A general layout of the anchor pullout capacity problem
is shown in Fig. 1. The ultimate pullout capacity of a plate
anchor in undrained clay is generally expressed as a function
of the undrained shear strength in the following form
Fu
qu ¼ ¼ su Nc (1)
A
where A is the anchor plane area, su is the undrained shear
strength of the clay, and the dimensionless factor Nc is
su0 su
su ⫽ suh in
k uniform clay
H
1
β suh
su ⫽ su0 ⫹ kz
B in NC clay
Anchor embedment depth,
where su ⫽ suh in NC clay z
Fig. 1. Model of strip plate anchors in NC clay
236 YU, LIU, KONG AND HU
usually referred to as the breakout/pullout capacity factor,
which can be calculated from
Fu
Nc ¼ (2)
Asu
Following the terminology of Rowe & Davis (1982), the
analysis of anchor behaviour may be divided into two
distinct categories, namely as ‘immediate breakaway –
vented’ and ‘no breakaway – attached’ respectively. In the
‘immediate breakaway’ case the clay–anchor interface sepa-
rates immediately upon pullout action, so that a gap is free
to develop behind the anchor. This represents the case where
there is no adhesion or suction between the clay and anchor.
In the ‘no breakaway’ case, the opposite is assumed, with
the clay–anchor interface sustaining adequate tension to
ensure the anchor remains in contact with the clay at all
times. In reality, it is likely that the true breakaway state of
an anchor will fall somewhere between the extremities of
the immediate breakaway and no breakaway cases. The
anchor pullout capacity of the immediate breakaway case is
always applied for practical design because it is more
conservative when compared with the no breakaway case.
For a non-homogeneous clay profile, the change in clay
shear strength with depth is assumed to vary linearly as
su ¼ su0 þ k z (3)
where su0 is the undrained shear strength at the mud line, z
is the depth below the mud line and k ¼ dsu =dz is the
gradient of strength increasing with depth.
Overall, the pullout capacity factor of a plate anchor in
the immediate breakaway case in clay, Nc , is the function of
anchor depth, anchor inclination, clay unit weight and the
clay non-homogeneity. A similar procedure was suggested in
most of the existing publications to obtain the pullout
capacity of a plate anchor in clay. That procedure and the
attempts to improve it by the current FE study are described
below
Step 1: calculate the pullout capacity factor of the plate
anchor in weightless uniform clay, Nc0, k¼0 . The representa-
tive solutions of Nc0, k¼0 were provided by Das (1980) using
small-scale model tests, by Rowe & Davis (1982) using FE
analyses and by Merifield et al. (2001) using numerical limit
analyses. The FE solutions of Nc0, k¼0 will be presented and
compared with the previous results in this paper.
Step 2: for inclined anchors in weightless clay, the pullout
capacity factor can be derived from
 2

tions are presented to fit the FE results of pullout capacity
Nc0,
6¼0 ¼ Nc0,
¼08 þ ð Nc0,
¼908  Nc0,
¼08 Þ (4)
908
where
is the anchor inclination angle, as shown in Fig. 1.
This equation was proposed by Das & Puri (1989) and was
verified by Merifield et al. (2005). The current FE results
will show that equation (4) is valid for pullout capacity
factors of vented plate anchors in weightless soils, but not
for the cases when soil weight is included, nor for the cases
of attached plate anchors.
Step 3: with the assumption that the effects of clay unit
weight and shear strength are independent of each other and
may be superimposed, the pullout capacity factor considering
clay unit weight can be calculated from
ªH
Nc ¼ Nc0 þ < N
c (5)
suh
where N
c is the limit/ultimate pullout capacity factor for
attached anchors. The limiting value of N
c for deeply
embedded anchors is a function of the anchor geometry and
anchor roughness. Most of the available publications pro-
vided the N
c value of an anchor with very large embedment
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ratio. However, the present study shows that the N
c value of
a shallowly embedded anchor is much lower than that of
deeply embedded anchor. Moreover, the anchor inclination
and clay non-homogeneity also have significant effects on
N
c value of shallowly embedded anchors. The ultimate
bearing factor of a very deep anchor is referred in the
present paper as the maximum ultimate bearing capacity

.
factor, N c,max
Step 4: for a non-homogeneous clay profile, Merifield et
al. (2001) presented equations with the similar form to the
following equations to calculate the weightless and ultimate
pullout capacity factors
Nc0, k6¼0 ¼ s k Nc0, k¼0 (6)
N
c, k6¼0¼ s
N

k c, k¼0 (7)
where s k and s
k are defined in this paper as the soil non-
homogeneity factors to the anchor capacity factor in weight-
less uniform clay and to the ultimate anchor capacity factor
in uniform clay respectively. Both s k and s
k are functions of
embedment ratio (H/B) and degree of clay non-homogeneity.
In the study by Merifield et al. (2001) kB=su0 was taken as
the degree of non-homogeneity in the range of
kB=su0 ¼ 0.1–1.0. However, for a practical clay strength
profile, as shown in Fig. 2(a), the upper bound and lower
bound of the clay shear strength are about su ¼ 2.0 + 1.5z
and 0.0 + 1.3z respectively. The clay non-homogeneity of
this practical case exceeds the study range of Merifield et al.
(2001). For example, for a large anchor with 5 m anchor
width, the clay strength at surface su0 would be very low in
offshore engineering. Thus kB=su0 could be very large.
Furthermore, the anchor pullout capacity is determined by
the clay in the vicinity of the anchor rather than the clay
close to the surface, especially for deeply embedded anchors.
Therefore, it could be more straightforward to take another
dimensionless factor, kB=suh , to describe the clay non-
homogeneity, where suh is the undrained shear strength of
the clay at the anchor embedment depth.
Therefore, the motivations of the present paper are
(a) to investigate the effect of anchor inclination and
embedment depth on the ultimate pullout capacity
factor, N c

(b) to investigate the effect of clay non-homogeneity on
Nc0 and N
c .
The dimensionless ratio of kB=suh is taken as the clay non-
homogeneity factor in the present paper. Approximate equa-
factors for various cases. Thus a design procedure based on
the fitting equations is proposed to estimate the pullout
capacity factor of a plate anchor with given depth, inclina-
tion, clay self-weight and clay strength profile in uniform
and normally consolidated (NC) clay.
FINITE-ELEMENT MODELS
The present numerical analyses were conducted by the
Afena FE package (Carter & Balaam, 1995). The clay was
simulated by elasto-plastic model with Tresca failure criter-
ion. Poisson ratio  ¼ 0.49 and friction and dilation angles
j ¼ ł ¼ 0 were set to simulate the undrained condition.
All of the FE calculations were based on six-noded
triangular elements with a three-point Gauss integration rule
to calculate the element stiffness matrices. The analyses
assumed a perfectly rigid plate anchor, progressively dis-
placed along the pullout direction. A full fixity was applied
at the base of the soil domain and roller conditions at its
vertical sides. The soil domain was defined in horizontal and
vertical dimensions as 20B for the cases of H/B ¼ 10 but
 NUMERICAL STUDY ON PLATE ANCHOR STABILITY IN CLAY 237
su: kPa su: kPa
0 5 10 15 20 0 10 20 30 40
0 0

su,CAUE
2 4

Approximate su,CAUC
3
linear relationship
su ⬇ 0 ⫹ 1·3z su,DSS
4 8
su ⬇ 2 ⫹ 1·5z
Depth: m

Depth: m
5

6 12

Vane 13
7
Vane 35
8 16
Vane 42
Approximate
9 Average linear relationship

10 (a) 20 (b)

Fig. 2. Undrained shear strength of the clay from Gulf of Guinea (from NGI/COFS (2006)):
(a) in situ vane tests; (b) laboratory test (CAUE, triaxial extension; CAUC, triaxial compression;
DSS, simple shear)

10B for all the other cases. Calculations for a larger mesh Normal spring
domain indicated that extending the boundaries farther away
from the plate anchor did not influence the calculated limit Shear slider
Nodes of
resistance force. A typical model for a horizontal plate plate anchor
anchor embedded at H/B ¼ 1.5 is shown in Fig. 3. Shear
The mesh close to the plate anchor is refined. The mesh spring
density (hmin ) and the displacement increment size (di ) were
chosen by the following criteria given by Hu & Randolph
(1998)
Nodes of
hmin soil elements
¼ 0:01 (8)
B
     0:8
di E kB
¼ 0:17 (9)
B su suh Fig. 4. Sketch of nodal joint elements

A numerical test shows that with further halving hmin and di

given by equations (8) and (9) can only achieve a further
convergence of not more than 0.2%, when the effective
anchor breadth is extended by half of the size of the
adjacent element to the anchor edge.
Elasto-plastic nodal joint elements, which follow Herr-
mann’s principle (Herrmann, 1978), were used to simulate
the soil–structure interaction. As shown in Fig. 4, a pair of
nodes is placed at the same initial geometric location
(separated in the figure for clarity). One stands for the rigid
Mesh refine zone
plate anchor and the other is the corresponding node of the
adjacent soil element. The node pair is linked with a normal
spring and a shear spring. The stiffness of the normal spring
was set up with a very large value relative to the soil
stiffness to avoid the penetration of the soil node into the
plate. For the vented (immediate breakaway) condition, the
normal force of every nodal joint element will be checked
after every calculation step. If tension force occurs, the
stiffness of the normal spring and the maximum shear force
of the slider are both set to zero and this is maintained for
all the following calculation steps. The maximum shear
strength of the shear slider, max , can be taken as max ¼ 0
for smooth anchors and max ¼ su for rough anchors, where
su is the undrained shear strength of the adjacent soil.
Smooth anchors were analysed in this paper to provide
conservative solutions. The effect of roughness on the
anchor pullout capacity will be discussed briefly later.

NUMERICAL RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Displacements applied on
these nodes
Fig. 3. Mesh details
Definition of failure
Figure 5 shows the responses of the anchor pullout
capacity factor plotted against its displacement for various
cases in weightless uniform clays. For the cases with

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238 YU, LIU, KONG AND HU
14

H/B ⫽ 10, β ⫽ 0°, attached

12
H/B ⫽ 10, β ⫽ 90°, vented
10 H/B ⫽ 10, β ⫽ 0°, vented

8
Nc
H/B ⫽ 6, β ⫽ 90°, vented
6
H/B ⫽ 6, β ⫽ 0°, vented

4
H/B ⫽ 1, β ⫽ 90°, vented

2 H/B ⫽ 1, β ⫽ 0°, vented

0
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
dtE/Bsu
γ8 ⫽ 2·5, 5, 7·5 and 10 ⫻ 10⫺7
Fig. 5. Typical Nc –pullout displacement curves
(a)

vented interface, only shallowly embedded anchors (H/

B < 6) can reach limit pullout resistance before dt E/
Bsu ¼ 100, where dt is the total displacement of the
anchor. For the cases of H/B ¼ 10 (vented), Nc cannot
reach the limit value until dt E/Bsu ¼ 1000, where the clay
failure mechanisms have just reached the clay surface, as
shown in Fig. 6(b). For these deeply embedded anchors in
weightless clays, the deformation due to plastic flow
before failure is so great that, for practical purposes,
failure would be deemed to have occurred at a load well
below the collapse load. That is why Rowe & Davis
(1982) defined the failure load as the load that would give
rise to a displacement four times that predicted by an
elastic analysis. However, for most deeply embedded an-
chors in offshore engineering, the surcharge due to clay
weight is quite large compared with the clay shear
strength (Wilde et al., 2001). This always ensures a fully γ8 ⫽ 2·5, 5, 7·5 and 10 ⫻ 10⫺7
localised clay flow mechanism and ‘attached’ condition
between anchor and clay when soil weight is relatively
large (ª’H/su . 6.4 for strip footing, Song et al. (2008)). (b)
Whereas for attached cases, Nc can reach the limit value
very quickly for all the embedment ratios with any pullout Fig. 6. Soil collapse mechanisms as depicted by arrows of nodal
angles (only H/B ¼ 10,
¼ 08 was plotted in Fig. 5). In displacement increments and contours of the octahedral shear
this paper, the pullout capacity factors of weightless clays strain increment (ª8 ) for H/B 10 in uniform weightless soil:
(a) d t E=Bsu 100; (b) d t E=Bsu 1000
are supposed to provide Nc0 values (pullout capacity factor
in weightless clay) for equation (5). Since soil weight
cannot be ignored in most offshore practices owing to the that the current FE results are a little lower than the upper
large anchor size and deep embedment, the ultimate values bound solutions when the anchor is deeply embedded. This
in the Nc –displacement curves were selected as the break- might be because of the much denser mesh (hmin /B , 0.01
out factors. Furthermore, this can ensure fully developed here but hmin /B ¼ 0.125 in Merifield et al. (2001)) used in
soil failure mechanisms. the current paper.
For vented anchors with small embedment ratios (H/
B , 3), all results by current FE analysis, Rowe & Davis
The pullout capacity factors of strip anchors in weightless (1982) and Merifield et al. (2001) stay closely together.
uniform clay However, for the vented anchors with large embedment
The pullout capacity factors of strip anchors in uniform ratios (H/B . 3), the solutions of Rowe & Davis (1982)
clay (su ¼ 20 kPa, ª ¼ 0) are calculated first and the results appear much lower than the other results. This might be
are presented in Fig. 7. The FE results of Rowe & Davis mainly due to the truncation criterion applied in Rowe and
(1982) and the numerical limit solutions of Merifield et al. Davis’ analysis, whereas the ultimate failure capacity was
(2001) are also presented for comparison. It can be seen that selected in the current FE analysis. The current FE results
for the cases with attached bases (no breakaway), Nc of both agree well with the solutions by Merifield et al. (2001),
horizontal and vertical plate anchors agree well with the since the limit analysis provides the ultimate capacities of
results of Rowe & Davis (1982). The current Nc of a the anchors by using rigid plasticity.
horizontal plate anchor reaches the limit value of
N
c,max ¼ 11.59 when H/B > 3, which is very close to the
solution of N
c,max ¼ 11.42 by Rowe & Davis (1982). The effect of anchor inclination on the pullout capacity
For the cases with vented bases (immediate breakaway), factors of vented anchors in weightless clay
the current Nc0 values fall favourably in the range of the Figure 8 shows the pullout capacity factors of vented plate
upper and lower bound solutions from H/B ¼ 1–10. Note anchors with various inclinations in weightless uniform

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 NUMERICAL STUDY ON PLATE ANCHOR STABILITY IN CLAY 239
14
clays. At all embedment ratios, the pullout capacity factor
N*c,max ⫽ 11·59 Nc0 is the highest for the vertical anchor and lowest for the
12
horizontal anchor. The soil displacement increments at
H=B ¼ 1 are shown in Fig. 9. The dashed lines, which were
10
formed according to the contours of the maximum shear
strain in the octahedral plane, show the approximate shear
8
slip planes. The shear contours are not plotted for clarity. It
Nc
can be seen that shear failure occurs only in front of the
6
plate anchor but not behind, owing to the vented condition.
For the horizontal anchor, the clay failure develops vertically
4
from both anchor edges to the surface (Fig. 9(a)). For the
H vertical anchor, the length of total clay shear failure planes
2
is obviously greater than that for the horizontal anchor. This
B results in the Nc0 of the vertical anchor being higher than
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 that of the horizontal anchor at H/B ¼ 1 in weightless uni-
H/B form clay. The soil flow mechanisms for rough anchors are
(a) also depicted in Fig. 9. The effect of anchor roughness will
14 be discussed later.
A simple relationship to estimate the capacity of inclined
N*c,max ⫽ 11·59 anchors, as shown in equation (4), has been proposed by
12
Das & Puri (1989) and confirmed by Merifield et al.
10 (2005). This equation is also valid for the current FE
results.
8 The values of the pullout capacity factors of horizontal
Nc and vertical plate anchors in weightless uniform clay can be
6 approximated by the following equations
Nc0,
¼08, k¼0 ¼ 2:483ln ð H=BÞ þ 1:974
4
H R2 ¼ 0:9999
2 B (10)
Nc0,
¼908, k¼0 ¼ 2:174ln ð H=BÞ þ 3:391
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 R2 ¼ 0:9999
H/B
(b)
Thus, the pullout capacity factor of a strip plate anchor
Attached, current FE study embedded at any depth and any inclination in weightless
Attached, FE (Rowe & Davis, 1982)
uniform clay can be calculated by equations (10) and (4).
Vented, current FE study
Vented, UB (Merifield et al., 2001)
The effect of overburden pressure
Vented, LB (Merifield et al., 2001) The existing publications (Rowe & Davis, 1982;
Vented, FE (Rowe & Davis, 1982) Merifield et al., 2001) show that the Nc of a plate anchor
increases linearly with the dimensionless overburden pres-
Fig. 7. Comparison of the bearing capacity factors for plate
anchors in weightless uniform clay: (a) horizontal anchor;
sure, ª H=su , but remains not larger than the ultimate
(b) vertical anchor pullout capacity factor N
c , as shown in equation (5). Both
of the publications gave only a limit value of N c
for
anchors at very deep embedment ratios. In expanding their
results, the effects of clay self-weight on plate anchors both
in uniform and in NC clays are calculated in this paper.
9 Only the cases in NC clay are presented in Fig. 10. The
current FE results show that the assumption of superimposi-
8 tion of the overburden pressure is also valid in NC clay;
however, the ultimate limit pullout capacity factor N
c
7
varies severely with anchor embedment ratios and inclina-
6 tions in NC clay.
Once the clay self-weight is included in the anchor analy-
5 sis, the soil flow around the anchor becomes localised at a
Nc0
4
rather shallow embedment. At the same time, the soil
β ⫽ 90° (vertical), 67·5°, 45°, adjacent to the anchor base is attached to the anchor without
3 22·5° and 0° (horizontal) a gap forming beneath it. This is due to the overburden
pressure generated from the soil weight and acting at the
2
anchor base. The current FE results show that, for plate
1 anchors at any embedment ratio with any inclination angle,
the ultimate pullout capacity factors of vented anchors with
0 very large overburden stress ratios of ª H=suh are almost
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 identical to those of attached anchors, only with a minimal
H/B
difference of less than 0.5% due to computer round-off
Fig. 8. Effect of inclination on Nc of vented anchors in uniform errors. For attached plate anchors, the clay weight (or over-
weightless clays burden stress) has no effect on the pullout capacity, since

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240 YU, LIU, KONG AND HU

β ⫽ 0° β ⫽ 45° β ⫽ 90°
(a)

β ⫽ 0° β ⫽ 45° β ⫽ 90°
(b)

Fig. 9. Flow mechanisms of the soil around the plate anchors with vented bases in weightless uniform clay (H/B 1):
(a) smooth interface; (b) rough interface

12
the clay weight does not change the soil flow mechanism
around the anchor. Thus there are two ways to obtain the
10 ultimate pullout capacity factor N c
: vented anchor with a
large overburden stress ratio of ª H=suh , or, attached anchor
8 with or without clay weight. Under these two scenarios, the
1:1 clays are both attached to the anchor bases and the N c

Nc 6 values should be identical.
The ultimate pullout capacity factors (N
c ) of plate an-
chors at various embedment ratios in uniform and NC clays
4
are plotted in Fig. 11. A vented base was assumed here and
H/B ⫽ 1, 3, 10
H the overburden stress ratio was taken as ª H=suh ¼ 10, which
2 was large enough to ensure a fully localised clay flow
B mechanism. It can be seen from Fig. 11(a) that all of the
0 pullout capacity factors reach a limit value of 11.59 at the
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 embedment ratio of H/B > 3. This limit value was defined
γH/suh
as the maximum ultimate pullout capacity factor (N
c,max ) in
(a)
this paper. Exact solutions for deeply embedded (infinitely
12 thin) circular plates range from 12.42 for a smooth interface
to 13.11 for a rough interface (Martin & Randolph, 2001).
The corresponding solution for a smooth strip anchor is
10
11.42 for the FE result by Rowe & Davis (1982), 11.16 for
lower bound and 11.86 for upper bound by Merifield et al.
8

(2001). The N c,max ¼ 11.59 by the current FE analysis falls
within the range of existing solutions.
Nc 6 It can also be seen from Fig. 11(a) that the N
c values of
shallowly embedded anchors (H/B , 3) increase with in-
4 creasing embedment ratio H/B and decrease with increasing
1:1
anchor inclination angle
. These variations have similar
H trends and become more profound in NC clay, as shown in
2 H/B ⫽ 1, 3, 4, 6, 10
B Fig. 11(b). For vertical plate anchors in NC clay (
¼ 908 in
Fig. 11(b)), the ultimate pullout capacity factor varies from
0 N c
¼ 4.88 at H/B ¼ 1 to N c
¼ 11.01 at H/B ¼ 10. The
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 maximum ultimate pullout capacity factor in this NC clay
γH/suh

(su ¼ 0.1 + 3z kPa) is also N c,max ¼ 11.59.
(b)
The values of the ultimate pullout capacity factors of plate
Fig. 10. Effect of overburden pressure (su 1 + 2z kPa): (a)
08; anchors in uniform clays can be fitted by the following
(b)
908 expressions

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 NUMERICAL STUDY ON PLATE ANCHOR STABILITY IN CLAY 241
out capacity factor N
c is the highest for a horizontal plate
14
N*c,max ⫽ 11·59 and lowest for a vertical plate. This trend is opposite to the
12
results in weightless clay presented above (Fig. 8). The soil
10 flow mechanisms of shallow plate anchors (H/B ¼ 1) in
uniform clay with ª H=suh ¼ 10 are shown in Fig. 12. It
8 can be seen that the soil failure planes of a horizontal
N *c anchor (Fig. 12(a)) develop deeply into the clay and the
6 β ⫽ 0° (horizontal), 22·5°, 45°, 67·5°, 90° (vertical) length of failure planes is longer than those of a vertical
anchor (Fig. 12(b)). This is why the ultimate pullout
4
capacity factor of a horizontal anchor is larger than that of
a vertical anchor.
2
The soil flow mechanisms of deeply embedded anchors
0 with attached bases are depicted by the octahedral shear
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 strain increments in Fig. 13. In uniform clay, the flow
H/B mechanism of
¼ 08 (Fig. 13(a)) is almost identical with
(a) that of
¼ 908 (Fig. 13(b)), except rotated by 908. This
14 confirms that the ultimate pullout capacity factors are the
N*c,max ⫽ 11·59 for β ⫽ 0° same for horizontal and vertical plate anchors with H/B > 3
12
in uniform clay, as shown in Fig. 11(a). Whereas, in NC
10
clay, the flow mechanism of
¼ 08 is almost the same as
that in uniform clay. However, for an anchor with
¼ 908 in
N*c ⫽ 11·01 for H/B ⫽ 10, β ⫽ 90°
8 NC clay, although the flow mechanism is still localised
N *c (without reaching the soil surface), it is obviously asymme-
6 trical to the anchor pullout direction and concentrates on the
β ⫽ 0° (horizontal), 22·5°, 45°, 67·5°, 90° (vertical)
upper side of the plate anchor, since the soil is weaker at
4 shallower depth. This is why the N c
value for an anchor
with
¼ 08 is higher than that for an anchor with
¼ 908
2 in NC clay, as shown in Fig. 11(b).
0
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
H/B The effect of clay non-homogeneity on the anchor pullout
(b) capacity factor
As discussed in the introduction, the dimensionless ratio
Fig. 11. Ultimate pullout capacity factors N
c in clay: (a) in of kB=suh is taken in this paper as the degree of clay non-
uniform clay; (b) in NC clay (su 0.1 + 3z kPa)
homogeneity, where suh is the undrained shear strength of
clay at the anchor embedment depth, as shown in Fig. 1.
When studying the effect of clay non-homogeneity, suh was
kept constant. The increase in kB=suh was realised by in-
N
c,
¼08, k¼0 ¼ 2:90ð H=BÞ þ 6:02 < N
c,max ¼ 11:59
creasing the gradient of soil strength k. The range of the
R2 ¼ 0:9999 clay non-homogeneity kB=suh is from uniform clay to NC
(11) clay of su ¼ 0.1 + 3z kPa, which covers the practical range in
N c,

¼908, k¼0 ¼ 2:72ð H=BÞ þ 4:02 < N
c,max ¼ 11:59 geotechnical design.

R2 ¼ 0:9997
The effect of kB/suh on Nc0 . Starting from uniform clay, the
The N c
of an inclined plate anchor can be calculated from increase of clay non-homogeneity, kB=suh , will enlarge the
  908 
2 reduction of the shear strength of the clay above the anchor
N
c,
¼ N
c,
¼908 þ N
c,
¼08  N
c,
¼908  embedment depth and also enlarge the increment of the shear
908 strength of the clay below the anchor embedment depth. In
(12) weightless clay, only the clay in front of the plate anchor fails
and flows plastically. The clay failure planes develop from the
Note that equation (12) is different from equation (4) on the anchor edges to the clay surface, as shown in Fig. 9.
right-hand side. Therefore, it is expected that the clay non-homogeneity
In both uniform and NC clays, the ultimate anchor pull- would decrease the pullout capacity factor of a vented plate

Anchor embedment
Anchor embedment depth level
depth level

(a) (b)

Fig. 12. Soil flow mechanisms of shallowly embedded plate anchors with attached bases (H/B 1):
(a)
08; (b)
908

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242 YU, LIU, KONG AND HU
1·1

γ8 1·0

0·0005 H/B ⫽ 1, 1·5, 2, 3, 4, 6, 10

0·9
0·0004
0·0003 0·8

Nc0
Nck
H

sk ⫽
0·7
B
(a) 0·6

0·5

0·4
0 0·2 0·4 0·6 0·8 1·0
kB/suh
(a)

1·1

1·0
H/B ⫽ 1, 1·5, 2, 3, 4, 6, 10

0·9 H

Nc0
Nck
B

sk ⫽
(b) (c) 0·8

Fig. 13. Soil flow mechanisms of deeply embedded plate anchors

with attached bases (H/B 6, depicted by the shear strain 0·7
increment in the octahedral plane, ª8 ): (a)
08, kB/s uh 0 (or
kB/suh 0.17); (b)
908, kB/suh 0; (c)
908, kB/suh 0.17
0·6
0 0·2 0·4 0·6 0·8 1·0
kB/suh
(b)
anchor in weightless clay. Here a non-homogeneity factor, s k , Fig. 14. Effect of soil non-homogeneity on the bearing capacity
is defined to express the effect of clay non-homogeneity on factors of plate anchors in weightless soil: (a) horizontal
the anchor pullout capacity factor in weightless clay anchor; (b) vertical anchor

Nc0, k6¼0 kB
sk ¼ (13) s k,
¼908 ¼ 1  f 90
Nc0, k¼0 suh
 0:5
H H (15)
f 90 ¼ 0:68  0:41 when ,4
where Nc0 is the pullout capacity factor of the plate anchor B B
in weightless clay.
Figure 14 shows the relationship between s k and kB=suh H H
f 90 ¼ 0:153 þ 0:341 when >4
for horizontal and vertical plate anchors at various embed- B B
ment ratios. It can be seen that for the horizontal anchor at
where the maximum difference between s k,
¼908 by this
any embedment ratios (Fig. 14(a)), s k decreases linearly with
equation and that by the FE analysis is also less than 1.4%.
increasing kB=suh . The gradient of the linear relationship is
a function of anchor embedment ratio, H/B. The clay non-
homogeneity factor of a horizontal plate anchor in weight-
The effect of kB/suh on N c
. Similar to the definition of s k
less clay, s k,
¼08 , can be approximately expressed by the
described above, a non-homogeneity factor of the ultimate
following equations
pullout capacity factor is defined as
kB N
c, k6¼0
s k,
¼08 ¼ 1  f 0
suh s
k ¼
(16)
N c, k¼0
 0:3
H H
:
f 0 ¼ 1 77  1:289 when ,4 (14) where N
c is the ultimate pullout capacity factor.
B B For the cases with high overburden stress ratios, the clay
H H behind the vented plate anchors would flow together with the
f 0 ¼ 0:192 þ 0:644 when >4 anchor similar to the cases of attached anchors. Thus clays on
B B both sides of the anchor contribute to the anchor pullout
capacity. Whether s
k is less or more than 1.0 depends on
where the maximum difference between the s k,
¼08 solution which part of the clay (over or under the anchor embedment
by this equation and that by the FE analysis is less than depth) contributes more to the pullout capacity. For a shallowly
1.4%. embedded horizontal plate anchor, for example H/B ¼ 1 with
For a vertical anchor, the relationship between s k,
¼908
¼ 08, the total length of the clay failure planes below the
and kB=suh is shown in Fig. 14(b). By applying linear anchor embedment depth is longer than that above the anchor
functions, the following equation can be used to calculate embedment depth (Fig. 12(a)). This means, for this case, the
s k,
¼908 clay non-homogeneity would have a positive effect on the

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 NUMERICAL STUDY ON PLATE ANCHOR STABILITY IN CLAY 243
ultimate pullout capacity factor. The FE results of s
k are where the maximum error between equation predictions and
shown in Fig. 15(a). As expected, s
k . 1.0 for H/B ¼ 1 and the FE results is less than 2.1%. For vertical anchors
1.5 with
¼ 08. For the case of H/B ¼ 2, the increase of kB
kB=suh has little effect on N c
before kB=suh ¼ 0.2, but has an s
k,
¼908 ¼ 1  f
90
.
obvious negative effect when kB=suh . 0 2. For horizontal suh
anchors with deeper embedment (H/B > 3), the fully localised
¼ 0:267 H H
f 90 when <3 (18)
clay flow mechanisms are mobilised, as shown in Fig. 13(a), B B
thus the effect of kB=suh on N
c of a deep horizontal anchor is H
f
90 ¼ 0:60 when .3
minimal (as shown in Fig. 15(a)). B
For all vertical anchors in NC clay, kB=suh has a negative
effect and leads to approximately linear reduction on N
c where the maximum error between equation predictions and
value, as shown in Fig. 15(b). With increasing anchor the FE results is less than 3.0%.
embedment ratios from H/B ¼ 1 to H/B ¼ 3, the negative For both horizontal and vertical anchors, the effect of clay
gradient of the s
k to kB=suh increases gradually. When non-homogeneity tends to have less effect on either N c0 or
anchor embedment ratio becomes higher (H/B > 4), fully N c
values with increasing anchor embedment ratio.
localised clay flow mechanisms are mobilised, for example
H/B ¼ 6 with
¼ 908 in Fig. 13(b) and (c), so the gradient
of s
k to kB=suh does not change much when the embedment The effect of anchor roughness
ratio varies from H/B ¼ 4 to 10. Smooth anchor–clay interfaces were assumed in the above
Efforts have also been made to obtain fitting equations of analyses to provide lower bound solutions for anchor pullout
s
k for horizontal anchors. Although it is difficult to achieve capacity. Some selected cases with rough interfaces were
perfect agreement with simple equations, the following equa- also carried out to provide an overall demonstration on the
tions are proposed. For horizontal anchors effect of anchor roughness. The percentage increases on N c0
   1:36 and N
c in both uniform and NC clays (su ¼ 0.1 + 3z kPa)

H kB kB are presented in Fig. 16. The comparison of the clay flow
s k,
¼08 ¼ 1 þ 0:8  0:3  0:383
B suh suh mechanisms of shallow plate anchors between smooth and
rough interfaces are presented in Fig. 9.
H (17)
when <2 For horizontal plate anchors, the weightless pullout capa-
B city factor, N c0 , is not noticeably affected by the anchor
H roughness both in uniform clay and in NC clay (as shown in
s
k,
¼08 ¼ 1:0 when .2 Fig. 16). This is because the symmetry of the soil flow
B
mechanism prevents the development of significant shear
1·15

30
1·10 H/B ⫽ 1
⫻ 100%: %

25
su ⫽ 0·1 ⫹ 3z kPa, β ⫽ 90°
1·05 su ⫽ 0·1 ⫹ 3z kPa, β ⫽ 0°
Nc0
Nck

20
*

H/B ⫽ 1·5
Uniform clay, β ⫽ 90°
sk* ⫽

N *c,rough ⫺ N *c,smooth

1·00 15
Uniform clay, β ⫽ 0°
N*c,smooth

H
H/B ⫽ 2 10
0·95 H/B ⫽ 3~10

B
5
0·90
0 0·2 0·4 0·6 0·8 1·0
kB/suh 0
(a) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
H/B
(a)
1·1 30
H/B ⫽ 10
⫻ 100%: %

1·0 H 25
su ⫽ 0·1 ⫹ 3z kPa, β ⫽ 90°
B
20 su ⫽ 0·1 ⫹ 3z kPa, β ⫽ 0°
0·9
Nc0
Nck

H/B ⫽ 6
*

N c0,rough ⫺ N c0,smooth

Uniform clay, β ⫽ 90°

H/B ⫽ 1 15
sk* ⫽

N c0,smooth

0·8 Uniform clay, β ⫽ 0°

H/B ⫽ 4
10

0·7 H/B ⫽ 3 H/B ⫽ 1·5

H/B ⫽ 2 5

0·6 0
0 0·2 0·4 0·6 0·8 1·0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
kB/suh H/B
(b) (b)

Fig. 15. Effect of soil non-homogeneity on the limit bearing Fig. 16. Effect of anchor roughness on anchor capacity factors:
capacity factors of plate anchors: (a) horizontal anchor (
08); (a) anchor in weightless clay (ª 0); (b) anchor in clay with
(b) vertical anchor (
908) enough weight (ª H=suh > 8)

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244 YU, LIU, KONG AND HU
stresses at the anchor–clay interface. The clay flow mechan-
isms of
¼ 08 smooth and
¼ 08 rough shown in Fig. 9 are
almost identical. This agrees with the findings of Rowe &
Davis (1982). However, the soil failure mechanism of verti-
cal anchors is asymmetric and shear stresses can be devel-
oped along a rough anchor–clay interface. From the cases of

¼ 908 in Fig. 9, it can be seen that the clay flow mechan-
ism of the rough anchor is obviously more extended than
that of the smooth anchor. From the zoom-in figures around
the top edge of the anchors it can be seen that, for the
smooth anchor, the clay adjacent to the front face of the
anchor moves freely upwards while the nodes stand for
the rigid anchor moving horizontally. However, for the rough
anchor, only the two nodes nearest to the anchor top edge
move upwards a little bit, all the other nodes move together
with the anchor nodes. The pullout capacity factor of a
vertical rough plate anchor at H/B ¼ 1 is about 8% higher
than that of a vertical smooth plate anchor in the current FE
analysis. This value is smaller than the 22% increase given
by the lower bound solutions (Merifield et al., 2001) for the
same case (H/B ¼ 1,
¼ 908) and also smaller than the 30%
increase given by Rowe & Davis (1982). However, there
were no detailed discussions on the effect of anchor rough-
ness by Rowe & Davis (1982) and Merifield et al. (2001).
Therefore, the reason for such a large difference is not clear.
The effect of anchor roughness on the ultimate pullout
capacity factor, N c
, is similar to that on the anchor pullout
capacity factor in weightless clay, Nc0 . Anchor roughness
has very little effect on a deep anchor and a horizontal
anchor.
It can also be seen from Fig. 16 that the roughness effect
is much larger in NC clay than in uniform clay. The increase
for a shallow vertical anchor in NC clay with su ¼
0.1 + 3.0z kPa can be more than 20%, for either Nc0 or N
c .
This is because the increasing shear strength gradient in-
creases the degree of asymmetry, which is displayed in Fig.
13(c), where a vertical anchor is deeply embedded at H/
B ¼ 6. Thus, a non-horizontal anchor would have a non-
symmetrical soil failure mechanism, which would in turn
generate shear force on the plate. This is why a 5% increase
in the ultimate pullout capacity factor was still obtained for
a deeply embedded vertical anchor in NC clay.
Suggested procedure for estimating the anchor pullout
capacity
The pullout capacity factor of a strip plate anchor in
uniform or NC clay, Nc , can be calculated by the following
procedure, and the flow chart for design is summarised in
Fig. 17.
(a) Determine representative values of the soil parameters
suh (suh ¼ su0 þ kH in NC clay), ª and kB=suh, the
anchor size B , inclination angle
and embedment
depth H.
(b) Calculate the weightless pullout capacity factor of
horizontal and vertical anchors in uniform clay,
Nc0,
¼08, k¼0 and Nc0,
¼908, k¼0 using equation (10).
(c) Calculate the clay non-homogeneity factors of the
weightless pullout capacity factor, s k , for horizontal
and vertical anchors by equations (14) and (15). Thus,
the pullout capacity factors of horizontal and vertical
anchors in weightless NC clay, Nc0,
¼08, k6¼0 and
Nc0,
¼908, k6¼0 , can be obtained by equation (6).
(d ) Calculate the pullout capacity factor of an inclined
plate anchor in weightless NC clay, Nc0 , using equation
(4).
(e) Obtain the ultimate pullout capacity factor of horizontal
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and vertical anchors, N
c,
¼08, k¼0 and N c,

¼908, k¼0, from
equation (11).
( f ) Calculate the non-homogeneity factors of the ultimate
pullout capacity factors of horizontal and vertical
anchors, s
k , using equations (17) and (18). Thus the
ultimate pullout capacity factors of horizontal and
vertical plate anchors in NC clay, N c,

¼08, k6¼0 and
N
c,
¼908, k6¼0 , can be obtained by equation (7).
(g) Predict the ultimate pullout capacity factor of an
inclined plate anchor, N
c , using equation (12).
(h) Superpose the overburden pressure; the final pullout
capacity factor Nc can be calculated from equation (5).
CONCLUSIONS
An FE study into the pullout capacity of strip plate
anchors in uniform and NC clays has been presented. Con-
sideration has been given to the coupling effects of anchor
embedment ratios, anchor inclination, clay self-weight and
clay non-homogeneity. The results have been presented as
pullout capacity factors in both graphical and numerical
form to facilitate their use in solving practical design
problems. A systematic design procedure has also been
proposed.
The following conclusions can be drawn from the results
presented in this paper.
(a) The anchor inclination has two distinct effects on the
anchor pullout capacity factor. In weightless clay,
Nc0,
¼908 of the vertical vented anchor is the highest
and Nc0,
¼08 of the horizontal vented anchor is the
lowest at a given embedment ratio. On the other hand,
when ª H=suh is large enough, or with attached
anchor–clay interfaces, N c,

¼08 of the horizontal anchor
is the highest and N
c,
¼908 of the vertical anchor is the
lowest.
(b) The assumption of superimposition of the overburden
pressure is valid for vented plate anchors in both
uniform and NC clays. The ultimate pullout capacity
factor, N
c , decreases with increasing anchor inclination
angle,
, and increases with increasing anchor embed-
ment ratio, H/B, until the maximum pullout capacity

, is reached. The effect of anchor
factor, N c,max
inclination on N
c in NC clay is greater than that in
uniform clay.
(c) The pullout capacity factors of attached anchors are the
same as those of vented anchors with large soil
overburden stress ratio, ª H=suh , which is the ultimate
pullout capacity factor, N
c .
(d ) The degree of soil non-homogeneity, kB=suh , has an
approximately linear negative effect on anchor pullout
capacity in weightless clay. The reduction was up to
50% for horizontal anchors and 30% for vertical
anchors.
(e) For horizontal anchors, the increase in the degree of
clay non-homogeneity, kB=suh , will increase the value
of the ultimate pullout capacity factor, N
c , for shallow
anchors (H/B < 1.5), but decrease N c
value for deeper
anchors (H/B > 2). The change in N
c value due to clay
non-homogeneity for horizontal anchors is less than
15%. For vertical anchors, the increase in the degree of
clay non-homogeneity, kB=suh , decreases N
c value for
anchors at any embedment ratios. The reduction in N c

value is up to 30% for shallow anchors. The reduction
becomes less with increasing anchor embedment ratio.
( f ) The anchor roughness has an obvious positive effect on
anchor pullout capacity where an asymmetrical soil
flow mechanism is formed. Because of this, the anchor
roughness has more effect on a vertical anchor than on
 Input design parameters (suh ⫽ su0 ⫹ kH, γ, H, B, β, kB/suh)

Nc0, β⫽0°,k⫽0 ⫽ 2·483 ln(H/B) ⫹ 1·974 N*c,β⫽0°,k⫽0 ⫽ 2·90(H/B) ⫹ 6·02 ⭐ N*c,max ⫽ 11·59
Eq. (10) Eq. (11)
Nc0, β⫽90°,k⫽0 ⫽ 2·174 ln(H/B) ⫹ 3·391 N*c,β⫽90°,k⫽0 ⫽ 2·72(H/B) ⫹ 4·02 ⭐ N*c,max ⫽ 11·59

1.36
 H  kB  kB  H
kB s*k,β⫽0° ⫽ 1 ⫹  0.8 − 0.3  ⋅ ⫺ 0·383  when ⭐2
 B  suh  suh  B
sk,β⫽0° ⫽ 1 ⫺ f0 Eq. (14) kB
suh sk,β⫽90° ⫽ 1 ⫺ f90 Eq. (15) Eq. (17)
suh
0.3
H
H s*k,β⫽0° ⫽ 1·0 when ⬎2
 H 0.5 B
f0 ⫽ 1·77   − 1.289 when ⬍4  H H
 B B f90 ⫽ 0·68   − 0.41 when ⬍4
 B B
H H
H H s*k,β⫽90° ⫽ 1 ⫺ f *90 kB f *90 ⫽ 0·267 when ⭐3
f0 ⫽ 0·192 ⫹ 0·644 when ⭓4 H H suh B B
B B f90 ⫽ 0·153 ⫹ 0·341 when ⭓4
B B Eq. (18)
H
f *90 ⫽ 0·60 when ⬎3
B

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Nc0,β⫽0°,k⫽0 ⫽ sk,β⫽0° · Nc0,β⫽0°,k⫽0 Nc0,β⫽90°,k⫽0 ⫽ sk,β⫽90° · Nc0,β⫽90°,k⫽0 Eq. (6) N*c,β⫽0°,k⫽0 ⫽ s *k,β⫽0° · N*c,β⫽0°,k⫽0 N*c,β⫽90°,k⫽0 ⫽ s *k,β⫽90° · N*c,β⫽90°,k⫽0 Eq. (7)

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2 2
 β  90° − β
Nc0 ⫽ Nc0,β⫽0° ⫹ (Nc0,β⫽90° ⫺ Nc0,β⫽0°) ·  Eq. (4) N*c ⫽ N*c,β ⫽90° ⫹ (N*c,β⫽0° ⫺ N*c,β⫽90°) ·  Eq. (12)
 90°

 90° 
NUMERICAL STUDY ON PLATE ANCHOR STABILITY IN CLAY

γH
Final result, Nc ⫽ Nc0 ⫹ ⭐ N*c Eq. (5)
suh

Fig. 17. Design flow chart

245
246 YU, LIU, KONG AND HU
a horizontal anchor. At the same time, it has more Das, B. M., Tarquin, A. J. & Moreno, R. (1985b). Model tests for
effect on the anchors in NC clay than those in uniform pullout resistance of vertical anchors in clay. Civ. Engng Practi-
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Natural Science Foundation of China (50978045, 90815024). plastic non-homogeneous soil with large deformation. Comput.
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dt total displacement applied to the plate anchor circular foundations. Proc. 10th Int. Conf. Comp. Methods Adv.
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centre) anchors in undrained clay. Géotechnique 51, No. 2, 141–153,
k soil strength gradient doi: 10.1680/geot.2001.51.2.141.
kB=suh degree of soil non-homogeneity Merifield, R. S., Lyamin, A. V., Sloan, S. W. & Yu, H. S. (2003).
Nc anchor pullout capacity factor Three-dimensional lower bound solutions for stability of plate
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