When the surface soils cannot carry the load
Deep foundations are commonly used for building in areas with poor soil conditions at the surface, but they can also be used to anchor very tall or heavy structures. Piles, piers, caissons, or other large supports are installed deep into the ground so the foundation can distribute the weight of the structure over a larger, more stable area. The depth of the foundation depends on how tall and heavy the final product will be.
Across south Louisiana and the Gulf Coast, soft surface soils are a common design condition, which is why deep foundations show up on so many industrial, public and commercial projects in the region.
Materials and methods
The supports can be made from a variety of materials, ranging from concrete to steel, and are used to build highways, bridges, high-rises, and other superstructures. Concrete piles can be precast or cast-in-place and are reinforced with steel rebar or other material to prevent failure. The site is excavated, and the supports are poured, driven, or drilled into the ground and embedded for stability. The type of pile or pier depends on the size of the build and the soil conditions.
Driven on federal work
On the Comite River Diversion, where Precision Construction was the USACE prime contractor, our crews drove 11,000 square feet of sheet piles and 142,000 linear feet of H-piles as part of a multi-segment civil package. Earthwork, deep foundations and a 40,000 cubic yard major concrete structure were executed in sequence by a single prime, so pile work was planned around the excavation before it and the concrete after it.
At Our Lady of Lourdes Stadium we self-performed the deep foundations and then the cast-in-place vertical concrete above them, working in an active campus environment with multiple adjacent stakeholders.
One team from the pile to the structure
Because we self-perform with in-house crews and owned equipment, the deep foundation is not a separate subcontract waiting on someone else. The same organization plans the piles, the caps and the concrete, which keeps tolerances, sequencing and safety under direct control. Owners and general contractors in Lafayette, Baton Rouge and across the Gulf South can send deep foundation scopes to our estimating team through the contact form.
Every job runs under the same safety program: daily job safety analyses before each task, routine site inspections, enforced PPE and full compliance with OSHA regulations, set from the top of the company down. With more than 300 jobs completed, that program is part of what owners get with every package we build.
