Soil wedge for resisting sliding?

[WWTEng]

Please see the attached rough sketch for a condition I have where there is soil on one side of the basement but the grade drops down along the side wall and there is no soil on the other side. So essentially I have unbalance soil load on the structure. I want to resist the sliding by either providing a key on the footing or by the dead weight+coefficeint of friction. For the second option (using weight to resist sliding) I was wondering if I can rely on the triangular wedge of soil as marked in blue.

 

[BAretired]

No, you cannot rely on that. Either the wall must be capable of standing on its own as a retaining wall or the floor system must act as a diaphragm spanning to the end walls.

BA

 

[briancpotter]

No, the soil load in the blue wedge doesn't weigh down on the structure, so can't be included in the dead weight.

However, in the past I've used the soil directly above the footing in the weight for friction calculations for overall building stability. If you need additional resistance, you can widen the footing so more soil bears on top of it.

Brian C Potter, PE

http://simplesupports.wordpress.com

 

[dcarr82775]

No. The soil directly over the footing yes, but the wedge outside of the footing no.