Development of software for analyzing stresses induced by mine pillars of arbitrary shape based on Newmark's influence chart

Foundation loading in mines typically occurs on pillars in underground mines which may not have necessarily a regular shape. The previous studied have mostly focused on the stress distribution within the pillar, rather than on the stresses induced in the underlying layers. In other words, a mining pillar has been mainly regarded as a column rather than a footing. The determination of foundation-induced stresses in rock and soil is of great importance when designing mine pillars. Hence, different methods have been presented to analyze the stresses induced in the ground due to the foundation loading. The influence chart is a graphical analysis method based on the elasticity theory which is capable of analyzing foundations with arbitrary shape. However, since this method suffers from difficulties associated with drawing and calculation, it has not been considered as an efficient method of foundation analysis. In this paper, a computer program is introduced and evaluated which determines the mining pillar-induced pressure using the influence chart method combined with image processing techniques. The software presents a graphical user interface which facilitates creating and editing of the foundation geometry. The developed program is capable of estimating the over-pressure value at given coordinates below the foundation. The modeling procedure in the developed software is much faster compared to other sophisticated numerical codes, while no discrepancy in results is observed. Hence, it would be considered as an efficient and handy numerical tool in preliminary studies.