C
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Pile driving hammer manufacturers and their representatives were
instrumental in the development of GRL. An intimate knowledge
of the working principles of pile driving hammers is invaluable
when analyzing measured data or predicting driveability.
Celebrating
our 85th
Anniversary
• dock and wharf construction
• pile driving
• maintenance and repair work
• bulkhead and fender systems
• crane services on land
and from barges
210 21st St. South, Texas City, TX 77590
409-945-3459 Pilinginc.com
traveling wave concept, providing a true physical representation of
what happens in a pile during the hammer impact.
In the early 1970s, Goble saw the potential benefit from the
Case research to the driven pile industry, and began to informally
offer testing services for the private sector. In 1972, Goble founded
Pile Dynamics, Inc. (PDI), a firm dedicated to building the necessary
hardware to carry out dynamic load testing, most notably the
Pile Diving Analyzer® (PDA) system.
There were quite a few early champions who supported the
implementation of this then new and breakthrough technology.
Ray Grover, bridge foundation engineer with the Ohio Department
of Transportation, often attended demonstration tests for other
state transportation departments such as Minnesota, New York,
Pennsylvania, Georgia, Idaho and Florida. Ken LaFond of Twin
City Testing took advantage of dynamic testing on his many foundation
projects around Minnesota and the upper Midwest. News
of this practical approach to construction monitoring and pile
load testing spread offshore and to other countries: engineers at
Chevron Oil Company specified dynamic testing on large diameter
open-ended pipe piles for platform installations in the Gulf
of Mexico; Ing. Carlos Molina, construction manager at the Las
Truchas Steel Plant construction site, scheduled a series of dynamic
load tests on the west coast of Mexico; Chris Thompson of Trow
requested tests at various construction sites in Ontario.
On March 17, 1976, Gobel incorporated his consulting practice
as Goble and Associates, Inc. (later Goble Rausche Likins and
Associates, Inc. and then GRL Engineers, Inc., or GRL) with his
former graduate students, myself and Garland Likins. The interest
in dynamic pile measurements and analyses was so great that
Goble, Likins and I logged lots of, then unrewarded, frequent flyer
miles traveling from one end of the country to the other. It got a
little easier when Wondem Teferra, later the Philadelphia GRL
office manager, joined the company. Shortly thereafter, Goble
accepted the position of chairman of the civil engineering department
at the University of Colorado, and opened the first GRL
branch office in that state. I took over as GRL president, while
Likins directed PDI, with both active in the GRL day-to-day consulting
work. After joining the team in 1982, Mohamad Hussein
opened the Florida branch office a few years later.
Pile driving hammer manufacturers and their representatives
were instrumental in the development of GRL. An intimate
knowledge of the working principles of pile driving hammers is
MEMBER PROFILE – ENGINEERING AFFILIATE
Continued on page 84
82 | QUARTER 2 2016
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