Experimental study on interaction mechanism between slope soil and pile- supported wharf subjected to yard loads

The back yard loads of a wharf can cause lateral displacements at sloping shoreline sites, posing a challenge to the safety of the infrastructures. With the engineering prototype of a typical pile-supported wharf in Tianjin Port area and based on a large-scale geotechnical centrifugal platform, the deformation characteristics of the shoreline site, the displacement and internal force of the wharf under the action of yard loads are investigated. The results show that the yard loads cause significant horizontal displacements of the slope soil. The horizontal displacement of the soil occurs mainly in the area below the rear platform, which converges to zero as the distance from the yard increases. With the increasing yard loads, significant seaward horizontal displacements of the rear platform are produced, resulting in a reduction in the distance between the front and rear platforms, which in turn increases the risk of collision. The pile foundation at the rear platform is subjected to the horizontal deformation of the slope soil, and the bending moment from the top to the bottom of the pile is distributed in an S-shaped pattern. The bending moment of the pile in the front platform is significantly lower than that of the pile in the rear platform, with the peak value being less than 50%. The findings of this study can provide reference for the damage mechanism of the pile-supported wharf.