ABSTRACT
For several problems in geotechnical engineering, soil deposits may be idealized as horizontally layered systems with their properties not varying in the horizontal direction. For these cases, it is neither necessary nor is it efficient to use the full power of numerical methods (i.e. Finite Difference or Finite Element Method). The recognition of this has led to the development of a variety of less general but more efficient Semi–Analytical Methods (SAM) for particular classes of problems. The general approach in SAM is to use analytical solutions for the basics of the problem in developing the solution while making use of numerical transform methods for handling the complexity of loading and/or the geometry. Among these, the Finite Layer Method (FLM) is quite useful.
In this chapter, the basic elements of the FLM are introduced. The problems of ‘stress analysis’ and ‘quasi-static analysis of multi-layer porous media’ are used as a context. We limit our discussion to plain strain state and consider the layer properties to be homogeneous, isotropic and linearly elastic while we extend the formulation to the multi-layer systems. The complexity of the surface loading is handled by discrete Fourier transform. The solutions are implemented in MATLAB programs.
