Journal article
The effect of water jetting on spudcan extraction from deep embedment in soft clay
O Kohan, B Bienen, C Gaudin, MJ Cassidy
Ocean Engineering | PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD | Published : 2015
Abstract
Self-elevating mobile jack-ups units are designed to move to a new field after operation is completed, requiring extraction of the jack-up legs from the soil. However, the pull-out force mobilised by hull buoyancy alone may not be sufficient especially when the spudcan is deeply embedded in soft soil, where extraction in the field has been reported to take weeks in some cases. A technical solution used by the offshore industry to reduce spudcan extraction resistance is to employ a jetting system that ejects water through nozzles on the spudcan. A conceptual framework for estimating the required jetting flow rate applied at the spudcan base to enable successful extraction from soft clay soil ..
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Awarded by Lloyd's Register Foundation
Funding Acknowledgements
This work forms part of the activities of the Centre for Offshore Foundation Systems (COFS), currently supported as a node of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Geotechnical Science and Engineering and as a Centre of Excellence by the Lloyd's Register Foundation (LRF). LRF a UK registered charity and sole shareholder of Lloyd's Register Group Ltd., invests in science, engineering and technology for public benefit, worldwide. This research is supported by the Robert and Maude Gledden Postgraduate Research Scholarships and the Centre for Offshore Foundation Systems (COFS). The second and fourth authors are the recipients of an Australian Research Council (ARC) Postdoctoral Fellowship (DP110101603) and Laureate Fellowship (FL130100059) respectively. This support is gratefully acknowledged.