Full-Scale Cyclic Lateral Load Test of Reinforced Concrete Pier-Column

This paper presents results of a lateral load test of a heavily instrumented, monolithic drilled pier-column with dimensions selected to mimic a typical support system for a California highway bridge. Testing involved displacement-controlled slow reversed cyclic loading to large displacements. Analysis of test data indicated that: 1) the moment-curvature relationship for the pier was well predicted by a section analysis; 2) the modulus of the predicted load-displacement relationship for the pier-column from a beam on nonlinear foundation analysis was too low at small displacements when standard spring models were used, but predicted reasonably well when stiffer, site-specific spring models were used; 3) the analyses provided a good estimate of the failure load with either set of spring models; and 4) the plastic hinge depth and length were similar to that expected from established guidelines.