I have a 12' high bearing wall with a row of helical piles at the base of the wall. At the top of the wall, I will be supporting floor beams at 5' OC and columns that are spaced at 20' apart. The piles will be spaced at 4'-6".
Does Ram SS assume the wall is rigid and distributes the gravity loads along the length of the wall? Or does Ram SS not distribute the gravity loads and simply transmit them straight down?
I have never used a pile foundation with Ram SS before and was not sure it would be able to model this type of structure accurately.
A pile cap in RAM SS can only support a single column.
The only foundation we have for a wall is a continuous foundation. For a wall on a continuous foundation, the wall forces are lumped to the wall center, the continuous footing is assumed to be 10 times as stiff under the wall and and the foundation cantilevers are checked for capacity.
See also:
https://communities.bentley.com/products/ram-staad/w/structural_analysis_and_design__wiki/8147/ram-ss---foundation-faq
https://communities.bentley.com/products/ram-staad/w/structural_analysis_and_design__wiki/22998/modeling-continuous-foundations
A gravity wall setting on a beam transfers points load straight down.
https://communities.bentley.com/products/ram-staad/w/structural_analysis_and_design__wiki/7578/ram-ss-walls-faq
Answer Verified By: SVGregory