Analyses of Pre-Excavation Grouting for TBM Tunnelling

Pre-excavation grouting (PEG) is essential for mitigating groundwater inflow to unlined tunnel structures. Prevention of initial water inflow proved best practice to balance groundwater conditions throughout the utilisation of a tunnel. The grouted rock mass acts as a circumferential sealing barrier instead of a secondary lining to minimise groundwater inflow to an acceptable level over the structure's lifetime. The construction of unlined tunnels relies on existing favourable in-situ rock mass conditions with an overall low hydraulic head, mainly to keep the effort of grouting inferior and avoid an unbalanced proportion of pre-excavation grouting during the tunnel construction works. From the operational perspective of tunnelling works, pre-excavation grouting delineates the continuous excavation process of a TBM and represents a discontinuative work process. In addition, grouting includes an exploration process ahead of the cutterhead to predict the ground conditions to align the sealing demand of the rock mass. Generally, pre-excavation grouting foresees the drilling of mainly open boreholes with a considerable length of 20 m to 25 m ahead of the tunnel boring machine (TBM). Establishing a continuous grouted zone around the tunnel demands an overlapping of the grouting rings ranging from 2 m to 10 m. The overlapping decreases the excavation length of the TBM adequately. The repetitive grouting process interfering with the excavation consists of various processes such as exploration including water loss measuring (WLM), the drilling and grouting of boreholes and the hardening time. TBM tunnelling depends on the systematic and continuous implementation of construction procedures. Therefore, based on current static pre-excavation grouting, an agile combined grouting and excavation approach is presented, incorporating a reliable pre-excavation grouting, a systematic TBM excavation and a specific balance of long-term sealing and high utilisation rates for TBM excavation. © 2023, Ernst und Sohn. All rights reserved.