Plate Element or Solid Volume for Volume Piles

Question

Hi. I am modelling an underwater foundation with 4 piles and a 3.6m x 3.6m pile cap. I am using volume piles. Now my question is, should I model my pile cap by plate element or solid volume? Which would be better suited to my volume piles? Thanks in advance.

Hung Ho Manh · Answer

Hello Samiha, 
 You can use both these elements but generally, volume elements are better to model since it can consider the effects of its geometry while a plate is often used to model a thin element as its thickness is zero.

Stefanos Papavasileiou · Answer

Hello Samiha, 
 A useful article is this one Pile modelling in a 2D plane strain model .