You are on page 1of 13
Grouting for Tunnels DB Edwards, B Sc (Hons) Man MICE(K) ABSTRACT ‘This paper provides only an overview of what is a seemingly simple process of injecting material into the ground. It is significantly more complex the more one becomes involved in the process. It seeks to provoke thought amongst designers, and provides what can only bea brief synopsis of the need for methods and materials used to create a successful ground treatment project GROUND TREATMENT To have ground treatment or not that 1s the question Inany project where excavation is carried out in the ground, not only is there a duty of care on the construction team whilst the permanent structure is completed but there isa professional and moral responsibility to ensure that the completed structure is fit for the purpose intended. ‘The Tunnel Designer should ensure that the Client briefs complete and that his own terms of engagement allow him to do the requisite investigation and rigorous design ‘My own experience over a 30 yearsis, that there is usually an unforeseen ground condition during construction that may well have been detected if money was spent before the project got to site and the more esoteric project features costing more than the sum allocated to the ground investigation. In the mid 70's the Managing Director of the largest site investigation company in the UK suggested that the current spending on SI was of the order of 0.5% of project value and should and could be justified at 2% So having established that the client and designer are probably going to find it hard to justify the expense up front, it follows that a risk of adverse ground, conditions will affect the Contractor and the parties to the contract whilst a solution is sought. Itis noteworthy’ some of the most profitable ground treatment projects I have assisted in devising a solution and subsequently won, have been the emergency mobilisation of key expertise and plant. If ground treatment may be required ‘we have to determine © When ground treatment will be done (planned and predetermined or panic mode remedial) © Whatisits purpose © Howwill it be done Wealso have to asic Do we have enough information? How will the ground treatment be paid for? ‘Who has the specialist sills, personnel and plant? PRE TREATMENT OF THE GROUND Has the contractor got the technical resources and staff to execute the work? ‘The amount and extent of pre- treatment is dictated by accessibility at the surface and the desirability to ‘minimise disruption of the tunnelling process. Having established that there 4s suitable access probably at the portals and interim access points the method of treatment will be dictated by the depth of tunnel from surface and the extent of treatment deemed necessary, Other factors such as the nature of the over burden will dictate the methods employed by the specialist contractor to install grout holes which are generally 75-150 mm. The intensity of the pre-treatment is best discovered by initial site investigation followed by a ground treatment trial Having decided the function of the treatment, to be stabilisation of the tunnel strata, water control, surface structure maintenance or a combination. Post Tunnelling Treatment ‘What is the function of this treatment? © Consolidation of the rock mass © Contact grouting © Overall stabilisation of the tunnel strata Post tunnelling treatment may be necessary to consolidate the rock mass, ‘minimise water ingress or provide intimate contact between the tunnel lining and the rock mass. Typically, holes are for consolidation of the rock mass are up to 20 metres long and conducted after a contact grouting phase to fill the void between lining and rock Appropriate techniques in single phase grouting with micro-fine cements have been pioneered in Norwegian hard rock tunnels saving considerable amounts of time and money. GROUND TREATMENT METHODS ‘The method eventually chosen will reflect the © purpose of the treatment © the access available © availability locally of techniques Vastly different techniques are appropriate in rock and soil. Permeation grouting is the filling of intersces of the rock or soil, using appropriate materials and techniques to consolidate the ground (Little John, 2003) provides an historical perspective of 200 years of development of the technique. Figure 3 shows an innovative method of permeation grouting to enhance pile capacity. Compaction Grouting Is the injection, under relatively high pressures, of toothpaste consistency grout that essentially compacts soil lay formations. Its application Australia is limited but is widely used in the USA and the UK with great success (WWamer, 2003) describes compaction grouting development Compensation Grouting Essentially conducted through sleeved grout pipes or tube a manchettes to adjust ground levels as tunnels pass through compressible ground. Used extensively on the new underground Jubilee line in London it controlled settlements and represents the leading edge of grouting techniques with real- time monitoring of settlement and grout injection, using computer controlled plant Generally conducted from surface fan arrays or from specially dug shafts ‘with horizontal tube a manchettes, discreet quantities of grout are injected at precise locations, usually with computer controlled and linked dlectro-level monitoring techniques European cities with historical structures have enforced the use of this, sophisticated technique to prevent structural damage to historical ‘buildings Jet Grouting A grouting process developed in Germany and Japan for their generally uniform sands and silts. Using very high pressures (5000 psi) and requiring considerable care in application an execution, Jet-grouted columns up to 1.5 m diameter have been achieved and since this process requires up to $imillion investment in specialist plant, Australia has only recently started using the technique to underpin and create waterproof structures. Sotl Mrxing Deep soil mixing developed by the Japanese in the 80's to transform their silty coast line into load-bearing ground they have invested enormous sums of money one soil mix rigisin the order of 1.5 million SUS Successfully transported to the USA and applied on Jacksons’ Lake Dam to retro fit for additional earthqualce resistance over 27 deep soil mixing techniques have been identified by Bruce 2001). Used extensively on the Boston Freeway and a low-pressure version developed by the writer to stabilize reinforced earth-fill behind a wall. Scandinavians use lime and modest plant in their glacial lays to improve the capacity of the ground and whilst it is heavily used in the States, Australia is only recently talking on board the possibilities of this ground treatment technique ROCK GROUTING Rock grout is probably the most well- known of grouting practices to engineers working in design and construction, Despite being used on every most permanent dams tunnels and numerous other structures such as oil rigs, river ‘barges and in mines, the writer has seldom worked witha client either contractor or consultant who has been closely involved with the specialist grouting activities, Rock grouting commenced in France in 1802 by Charles de Bérigny almost 200 years ago using cement, with Australia advancing its use of grouting in the Snowy Mountains Scheme 150 ‘years later in the 1950's, Lombardi has suggested that rock grouting involves the injection of material into 2 or 3% voids existing in typical rock foundations compared with the 20-35% in soils. ‘The purpose of rock grouting on each project varies but may be: © Reducing the permeability aginst water flow © Enhancing the rock strength for foundations © Filling of voidsin eg caustic limestone The designer must ask himself what do I want to achieve on the project and howis it best achieved? Experience suggests that the specialist foundation contractors usually have options not ‘within the wildest imaginings of the design engineer Operating at or near the cutting edge of equipment, material and operational practices the specialist can draw upon the hundreds of projects he has worked on to optimize the techniques and materials available Grouting of rock is usvally for the reduction of permeability reducing the leakage under dams from say 100 Iugeons to an average of 3 A typical rock grouting scheme ona dam serves to consolidate the foundation under the dam core usinga ‘multiple row of shorter holes up to 15 ‘m long and typically a single row up to 45 m deep to reduce seepage under the structure ‘The 2 lem Long curtain under ‘Thompsons Creek Dam earth fill dam near Bathurst involved 60 000 m of drilling and 30 000 tonnes of Portland cement EI Cajon in Honduras concrete arch. dam required a complex network of galleies/tunnels from which 250 000 ‘m of drilling was done and more than 83 thousand tonnes of cement were injected Rock grouting in tunnels is often not quite so extensive and often involves the consolidation of the rock by fissure grouting to minimise settlements on the tunnel lining Typically done in fans extending up to 20 m from the ‘tunnel walls after lining installation, o directly in rock unlined tunnels such as the Norwegian hard rock tunnels to reduce water inflows What are the key ingredients of successfil rock grouting? © Site investigation and water testing to establish the base line permeability, joints etc © Bore-hole surveys —as was done on Canning Dam in WA and in Burley tunndl for the remedial ‘works. © A correct definition of the ‘requirements for grouting © Consultation with a specialist contractor who can enlighten the lient/designer on possible and probable solutions methods materials and equipment © A suitable specification written for the project specific needs, not a cut and paste of bad dam grouting specification © A properly thought out method of ‘payment for the works and if appropriate, a schedule of quantities As reported by Littlejohn (2003), ‘Sanbom and Lipser reported the use of grouting on a large scale in 1920 in New York State. Used to strengthen the rock around the tunnels and provide an effective seal in the high operational water pressures in the tunnels, In 1944 the Portland Cement Association in Chicago reported the successful scaling of cracks with finer ground cement to seal crack widths of 0.03 mm—0.76 mm. See table 1 below. Table1 Crack Width | Water Cement (um) Ratio by Wt 005-015 115 013-025 To 035-076 To Satisfactory mixes for crack sealmg (modified after Caison 1944) In practice it was more important to determine the minimum particle sizes and fissure widths that could be permeated by various grouts In 1935 Terzaghi stated his position in relation to cement grouting “No fissure can be cemented witha width of ess than about 0.1mm. For the same reason no fine sand or gravel with an admixture of fine sand can be grouted if the effective size ofa compact sand is smaller than about 1 4 mm or that ofa loose sand smaller than 0.5 mm — the grout merely displaces the material.” IP Morgan invented the colloidal mill in 1934 in which the high shear action ‘removed air, improved wetting and increased the proportion of fine cement particles. This colloidal mixer is still in use today. Inthe USA in 1951 grout injection refusal was reported to limit the flow rate at a specified injection pressure significantly lower than today’s practice. 1.4 litres/minute for 20 minutes at 345 KN/m, (1 cubic foot over 20 minutes at 50 psi equivalent 5.67 litres/min at 1380kN/m") Grouting pressures on dams in the 1950's (Grundy 1955) stated that allowable grouting pressures should be ‘twice the weight of overburden above the stage being grouted Lippold (1958) suggested that safe injection pressures with patches varied between 1.6 to 5.3 kN/m® per metre of cover, again dependent on overlying mass and geological structure Inthe last 50 years the ability of specialist grouting engineers to place stable grouts in the variable fissures in rock has increased. These have been ‘well documented in the ASCE, conferences in 1982, 199? and 2003 with notable milestones being 1. Homsby (1992) and his interpretation of modified Lugeon water tests. 2. The introduction of microfine cements and super plasticisers described by Gause & Bruce i997), 3. The adoption of real time computer monitoring of the drilling and grouting process throughout the 1990's, Lombardi and Deere in 1993 deriving the Grout Intensity Number GIN to use a single stable grout throughout the grouting process. This is probably the ‘most significant step in progress to find its way to Australia. The establishment cost barrier for the limited ground treatment market being too great for Australian specialists SOIL GROUTING A soil mass can exhibit an infinite variability that tests the specialists ability to design a grouting scheme to ‘© Improve the stability of the soil mass + Reduce seepage into or through the soil The key ingredients to success are defined by Littlejohn (2003) when the site investigation provides sufficient information to answer 1. Can the ground be grouted? 2. What types and amounts of grout are required? 3. Following treatment what strength improvement or permeability reduction can be anticipated? Guidelines are laid out in European Standard EN 12715 Execution of Special Geotechnical Work - Grouting, to assist the designer with his site investigation planning Asa first assessment the grouting specialist will study the grain size of the material and most importantly the proportion passing the 75 micron. For soils with greater than 15% passing the 75 micron sieve permeation grouting ‘with Portland Cement grouts Important practical limits on the coefficient of permeability prior to grout treatment include: © 5x 1074 misec for cement based grouts © 5x 1075 mlsec for clay chemical grouts © 1x 10°S to 5x 10°6 misec for chemical grouts ‘The pre-treatment ofa soil mass was successfully done for the Dartford Tunnel under the River Thames in ‘Thames gravel usinga clay cement and clay chemical grout in the mid 1950's. ‘This was the first use of the technique in UK tunnelling through alluvium with a full scale trial proving a reduction in permeability 1000 fold from 30.1 x 10"4 to 50 x 10-7 misec. Since that time the development of chemical grouts such as silicates resorcinol formaldehydes acrylamides and polyurethanes led to the routine adoption of multiphase clay cement silicate tube a manhette injection for much of the Hong Kong Metro. Figure 2 shows limitations of silicate grouting In 1967 Soletanche used clay cement and silicate acetate grouts to improve the compressive strength and reduce seepage at the Auber Metro Station in Paris within the Seine Alluvium. With a tunnel crown 18 m below street level and mainly below the water table the process is described by Jamin and Le Sciellor, (1970). ‘Wamer (1972) reported the strength testing of chemically grouted sands, Camberfort (1977) produced guidelines on the limits of permeation of grouts based on permeability ( Fig » By 1982 the mechanical behaviour of chemically grouted soils was better appreciated and in general strength was Janow to increase with increasing density and decreasing effective size D0 and the question of grout longevity was posed at the &* European Conference on Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering Finer ground cement became available, along with concrete technology products In 1988 the USBR employed super plasticisers for the first time in cement grouting for the Waddell Dam in Arizona Lenses of glacial tll at the Vemier Tunnel on the Geneva Motorway were treated with ultra-fine cement with the ‘new combination of silicon and calcium that would treat non-cohesive soils with permeability’s dowm to 1.5.x 10°. The treating of soil mass to improve its properties may be by using Permeation grouting Displacement (compaction) grouting Jet grouting Soil mixing ‘The most cost-effective process is dictated by not only the quality of the site investigation but the physical location and accessibility of the site The grouting treatment designer must consider 1, The depth to and thickness of treatment required. 2. Access from the surface, from adjacent land, or from within the tunnel In some situations the pre-treatment of ground to be tunneled through may be essential, desirable or occasionally impracticable. The ground may be treated from the surface as often done in the Hong Kong Metro, from small diameter shafts sunk adjacent to the tunnel alignment as on the London Jubilee line or treated in advance of tunnel excavation as in the Subsea tunnels in Norway. ‘The application of grout to the ground ‘will depend upon the nature of the

You might also like