Complete limiting stress solutions for the bearing capacity of strip footings on a Mohr–Coulomb soil

The method of characteristics is used to develop equilibrium limiting stress solutions for the problem of the vertical bearing capacity of strip footings on cohesionless soils. This note extends and completes the solutions of Lundgren & Mortenson (1953) by demonstrating the existence of equilibrium stress fields nowhere violating yield

The solutions presented are thus demonstrated as rigorous lower bounds for an associative material. Resulting N_γ values are compared with those in the literature and show good agreement with recently published numerical limit analyses. Pressure distributions beneath the footings are also compared with the elastic Boussinesq analysis and the load...