Interaction between a steel minipile footing system and expansive soils

Expansive soils undergo alternate swelling and shrinkage upon seasonal moisture changes, causing distress and damage to light structures constructed on them and heavy financial loss. A newly-developed driven battered minipile group footing system may reduce such ground movement-induced stress and associated damage. It is a low-impact, cost-effective, excavation and concrete-free alternative to traditional footing systems; however, its widespread acceptance among professional engineers has been limited as no study examined the mechanism of footing-expansive soil interaction due to seasonal ground movements. Therefore, a full-scale field experiment and numerical study was performed to evaluate this footing's ability to resist expansive soil-induced movements.