Impact Study of Deep Foundations Construction of Inclined and Straight Combined Support Piles on Adjacent Pile Foundations

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The topic dealt with in the article is of interest to the geotechnical engineering community, since it represents an original contribution that improves knowledge on the behavior of deep foundations that act in combination.

The authors should provide more information on the topics of the paper indicated below, as well as correct some necessary aspects.

Title, body of the manuscript and conclusions. As it is a very particular configuration of soil strata, the authors should review the entire text to avoid formulating ideas or drawing conclusions in a general way. In any case, they must indicate that the methodology may be applicable to cases in which other variants occur, but that the results are specific to the soil conditions shown.

Abstract. Fragments of the abstract are incomprensible, please, review carefuly the translation.

In general. Explain the role of the soil's characteristic on the expected results.

Section 3.1. The impact that earthquakes have recently had on the response of building foundations is well known, therefore, it would be interesting if the authors could provide some indications on how the configuration of foundations can affect the seismic response of buildings.

Section 3.1. Second paragraph. Please review the wording of this excerpt.

Figure 3. Indicate the units of this figure.

Section 3.1. The authors have used some dimensions and a specific mesh, it would be interesting if they can provide data or references from other authors that support the choice of the dimensions of the model and the mesh. They should answer questions like: is this the optimal mesh to represent this problem? Could the dimensions of the model affect the results? contribute to the discussion based on their own analyzes and those of other researchers.

Section 3.1. The authors must support the choice of an elastic model to represent the behavior of the piles and beams. Why not to use non-linear models?

Figure 17. Correct the unit of the forces, change KN for kN.

Section 5.5. The part corresponding to security is interesting, could you give a specific recommendation based on the results shown in the previous sections?

Conclusions. Mention the specific characteristics of the site in order to not generalize the conclusions of the paper.

Author Response

The authors would like to thank the Reviewers for their worthy comments because they will make the manuscript valuable.

"Please see the attachment."

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Review for applsci-2167207

It is a timely research which will be appreciated by peers. The paper is well-designed, well-structured and convincing. However, several minor issues should be addressed before it can be accepted:

1. The research gaps were not fully discussed.

2. A figure is highly suggested to present the workflow.

3. The paper employed traditional finite element analysis. Please compare the finite element analysis with other related methods in the same field.

4. This paper mainly discussed finite element analysis. How about the impact of deep foundation construction?

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

The authors would like to thank the Reviewers for their worthy comments because they will make the manuscript valuable.

"Please see the attachment."

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments for Authors and Editor

This paper investigates the application of inclined and straight piles combination in deep foundation pit support. The effect of pit angle, depth of excavation, and the pile’s distance to foundation pit are shown among parameters that affect the bending moment and horizontal displacement demand. The reviewer recommends that the authors provide more explanation regarding the following questions:

1-      why does the pit angle of 15 degree cause smaller demands than pit angle of 10 and 20?

2-      How the conclusion may change if the water level is set at 6 m, 9 m, or alternatively 12 m?

3-      Based on the bending moment variation would authors recommend to simplify the pile modeling procedure using a cantilever (or pined-pined) column?

Comments for author File: Comments.docx

Author Response

The authors would like to thank the Reviewer for his worthy comments because they will make the manuscript valuable.

"Please see the attachment."

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Everithing is ok.