Drilled Piling for Demanding Ground Conditions

Drilled piling is part of our range of ground engineering services, alongside driven piling and excavation shoring. In drilled piling, the steel pipe is generally taken to the required depth in bedrock using the down-the-hole (DTH) hammer technique; depending on the site, the pile may also end at a design depth in the soil.

As a method, drilled piling offers a reliable and precise solution combined with high bearing capacity. Drilled piling is particularly well suited to sites with challenging ground conditions. These challenges may include, for example, poor-quality subsoil, bouldery and stony ground, and sloping bedrock surfaces. In built-up and vibration-sensitive environments, drilled piling is an excellent solution, as it causes considerably less vibration than driven piling.

Drilled piling is a versatile method. Piles can be installed as bearing piles, designed with anchors for tensile loads, and used as retaining walls for excavations. The range of steel pile sizes used in Finland is wide: micropiles d89–d323.9 and large-diameter piles d406–d1220. Our offering includes several types of retaining wall, such as the drilled pile wall, drilled pile sheet wall (settiseinä), combi wall and the traditional steel sheet pile wall, depending on the client's needs.

On our sites we use only type-approved steel pipes conforming to SFS-EN 10219-1. Our drilling systems are Finnish-made and meet the Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency's (Väylä) technical requirements for drilled pile tip components.

Where the ground allows driving, the most cost-effective solution is often driven piling. In city-centre excavations, drilled piles also serve as part of excavation shoring, for example as drilled pile walls.