Types of pile  55

grab rigs, thereby reducing the potential for the excavation to collapse. Barrettes are usually
only economical when the rig is mobilised for the construction of other basement walls.

2.4.3╇ Continuous flight auger piles

Continuous flight auger or auger-injected piles, generally known as CFA piles, are installed
by drilling with a rotary CFA to the required depth. They are now the most popular type
of pile in the United Kingdom, used in a variety of ground conditions for bearing piles
and as contiguous/secant pile walls. They are, however, best suited for ground conditions
where the majority of the applied load is resisted by shaft friction and the ground is free
from large cobbles and boulders. The CFA pile has considerable advantage over the conven-
tional bored pile in water-bearing and unstable soils in that temporary casing is not usually
needed, although, as noted below, the range of soil conditions which can now be augered
has increased with the application of simultaneous casing methods.
The established practice is to bore the shaft using a CFA with a hollow stem temporar-
ily closed at the bottom by a plug. After reaching the final level, a high slump concrete is
pumped down the hollow stem displacing the plug, and once sufficient pressure has built up,
the auger is withdrawn at a controlled rate, removing the soil and forming a shaft of fluid
concrete extending to ground level (Figure 2.31) or lower cut-off level. Thus, the walls of the
borehole are continually supported either by the spiral flights and the soil within them or
by the concrete. Self-compacting concrete with grades as described for the above-mentioned
bored piles is used with a plasticiser added to improve its ‘pumpability’, in accordance with
the rules in BS EN 206-9. If concrete flow is not achieved, it is necessary to remove the auger

Spoil from
Minimal spoil borehole
Hollow stem auger at surface

Spoil supporting
Spoil supporting
borehole
borehole
Reinforcement
cage

Concrete
injection

Temporary plug
while drilling
(a) (b) (c) (d)

Figure 2.31╇ Stages in construction of a CFA pile. (a) Flight auger rotated to form borehole. (b) Auger
reaches required depth. (c) Concrete injected as auger rotated from hole. (d) Reinforcement
cage inserted into wet concrete.
56  Pile design and construction practice

and re-drill (possibly after backfilling) to 0.5 m below the initial depth before recommenc-
ing concreting. The reinforcing steel cage, complying with the requirements for bored piles,
can be pushed into the fluid concrete to a depth of about 15 m. Vibrators may be used to
assist penetration. The shaft diameters range from the 100 mm micropile sections (in which
sand–cement grout may be injected in place of concrete) up to 1200 and 1500 mm excep-
tionally. Load capacities up to 7500 kN and depths up to 34 m are now feasible (see Table
3.6), depending on ground conditions and pile dimensions.
In stable ground above the water table, it may be advantageous to remove the auger and
place high slump concrete as in an unlined cast-in-place bored pile. The auger should never
be withdrawn before concreting in unstable or water-bearing soils. BS EN 1536 requires
that where unstable soil conditions are expected, a trial bore should be drilled, unless expe-
rience of the same conditions shows the CFA method is feasible.
The drilling operations are reasonably quiet and vibrations are low making the method
suitable for urban locations (although the larger rigs can exceed 100 dBA when installing
casing). As with any other in situ type of pile, the CFA pile depends for its integrity and load-
bearing capacity, on strict control of workmanship. This is particularly necessary where
a high proportion of the load is to be carried in end bearing. Because it is not possible to
check the stratification and quality of the soil during installation as with conventional bored
piles, considerable research and development has been undertaken by piling companies into
the use of computerised instrumentation to monitor the process and ensure the quality and
integrity of CFA piles. A computer screen is positioned in the drilling rig cab in front of
the operator which continuously displays the boring and concreting parameters. During
the boring operation, the depth of auger, torque applied, speed of rotation and penetration
rate are displayed. During concreting, a continuous record of concrete pumping pressure
and flow rate is shown, and on completion, the results are provided on a printout of the
pile log which records the construction parameters and under- or oversupply of concrete
(Figure 2.32). Most specifications for CFA piles(2.5) require the rig to be provided with such
automated instrumentation to control the process, relieving the operator of some of the
decision-making. Regular checks to ensure the reliability of the controls are essential. Even
with this monitoring, doubts may exist in certain ground conditions as to whether or not the
injected material has flowed out to a sufficient extent to cover the whole drilled area at the
pile toe. For this reason, it may be advisable either to assume a base diameter smaller than
that of the shaft or to adopt a conservative value for the end-bearing resistance. Farrell and
Lawler(2.24) describe the need to reduce the bearing capacity factor in some stiff glacial tills.
In addition, ‘polishing’ of the shaft can occur in stiff clays due to over-rotation and ‘over-
flighting’ (i.e. vertical movement of the soil on the auger relative to the soil on the wall of the
borehole resulting in local shaft distortion) which, in loose silty sands where over-rotation
disturbs the surrounding soil, can reduce shaft resistance by 30%.
To address the problem of overflighting and loss of ground in soft soil leading to settle-
ment and concreting difficulties, techniques have been developed to install temporary casing
while simultaneously advancing the auger to the foundation depth, the cased auger pile as
described in Section 3.3.3. The casing is normally withdrawn during concreting, but per-
manent steel liners can be installed to reduce downdrag and protect concrete in aggressive
ground. Where the concrete has to be cut off below ground level, concreting through the
auger stem is stopped at a level above the cut-off. The auger is then removed from the tem-
porary casing at the required level using a flap valve to retain the soil on the auger to leave
an open cased hole. The reinforcement is pushed into the concrete and the casing withdrawn
while backfilling the hole above the concrete. As the cased CFA pile can be installed more
accurately than the standard CFA method, it is increasingly used for constructing secant
pile walls. Bustamante et al.(2.25) have also shown that the cased CFA system can effectively
 Types of pile  57

Pile: 04

System pressure (bar) Boring rot. (rev/0.5m) Boring rate (m/min)

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 –1 0 1 –5 0
0 19s 0
16s
1 15s 1
16s
Contract: 2 2
14s
SDO126 17s
3 3
Rig: CM48 17s
Pile: 04 20s
4 4
Date: 07/02/2006 15s
16s
Diameter: 600 mm 5 5
16s
Bored length: 12.22 m
Depth (meters)

22s
Total bored revs: 26.0 6 6
30s
Nominal volume: 3.46 m3 26s
Placed volume: 4.28 m3 7 7
36s
Av.oversupply: 24%
36s
Boring start: 1:03 pm 8 8
31s
Boring finish: 1:12 pm 35s
9 9
Concrete start: 1:14 pm 28s
Concrete finish: 1:22 pm 24s
10 10
Key: 29s
A – auger extension/section 27s
11 11
C – waiting for concrete 30s
O – obstruction or hard drilling 26s
B – blockage R – rebore 12 12
22s
F – breakdown

Swan-neck (bar) Volume (m3/0.5 m) Oversupply% Extr. rot. (rev/0.5 m) Extr. rate (m/min)
–1 0 1 2 3 0 0.1 0.2 0 20 40 –1 0 1 0 1 2 3
0 0 0
0.5 16 25s
1 8 30s
1 1 14s 1
1.5 16
2 19 14s
2 2 2
2.5 19 13s
3 16 15s
3 3 3
3.5 2 186s
4 19 14s
4 4 4
4.5 17 14s
5 21 13s
5 5 5
5.5 20 13s
Depth (m)

6 16 14s
6 6 6
6.5 22 14s
7 19 14s
7 7 7
7.5 21 14s
8 16 13s
8 8 8
8.5 20 13s
9 19 14s
9 9 9
9.5 16 14s
10 22 14s
10 10 10
10.5 18 13s
11 19 14s
11 11 11
11.5 20 14s
12 21 13s
12 12 12
12.5 5 B 123s

Figure 2.32╇ Pile log for CFA pile. (Courtesy of Stent Foundations Ltd., Basingstoke, UK.)