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INSTRUCTOR: 
Alexander Newman, P.E., F.ASCE

Purpose and Background

Many design and construction professionals perform foundation design only infrequently and may not be familiar with the latest practices for this work. The purpose of this web seminar is to provide a primer on these practices and to offer a concise, yet practical, coverage of the main issues. The presentation examines typical design and construction challenges and the ways of meeting them.

The webinar begins with a brief overview of the modern foundation systems and proceeds to the discussion of soil related issues. Many foundation failures have been traced to a simple fact that the designers and builders did not understand the soils they were building on. Since the foundation is only as good as the soil underneath, anyone who attempts to design a foundation should first become familiar with the soil at the site. Without getting overly technical, the instructor explains how various soils influence the strength and settlement of foundations and what makes these soils behave differently.

With the soil basics explained, the discussion moves to the design of shallow foundations – wall and column footings and mats. After working through a number of design examples involving simple foundations, the participants examine some situations where complex shallow foundations can be useful. These complex shallow foundations include combined, cantilever, and eccentric footings. The next topic is deep foundations: deep piers (caissons), piles and minipiles. The instructor explains how each system works and shows some actual designs.

Benefits and Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of this course, you will be able to:

• Identify common types of building foundations
• Explore foundation-related code provisions
• Work through design examples for simple foundations
• Recognize which foundation designs are appropriate for difficult situations
• Discuss the nuts and bolts of working with various soils and how soils affect strength and settlement of foundations

Assessment of Learning Outcomes

Students' achievement of the learning outcomes will be assessed via a short post-assessment (true-false, multiple choice and fill in the blank questions).

Who Should Attend?

Structural and civil engineers and other design and construction professionals seeking to learn the basics of building foundation design will benefit from this webinar.

Outline

• Introduction: Types of building foundations
• Basics of foundation design and construction
• Types of soil, establishing bearing capacities
• Settlement of foundations on sandy soil and on clay
• Shallow foundations
• Wall footings
• Column footings
• Complex foundations: Combined, cantilever, eccentric footings
• Mats
• Deep foundations
• Piers (caissons)
• Piles and minipiles
• Conclusion

How to Earn your CEUs/PDHs

This online course is worth .2 CEUs /2 PDHs. To receive your certificate of completion, you will need to complete a short on-line post-test and receive a passing score of 70% or higher within 30 days of the course.

How do I convert CEUs to PDHs?

1.0 CEU = 10 PDHs [Example: 0.1 CEU = 1 PDH]