Effect of seawater on the applicability of a slurry shield TBM

해수가 슬러리 쉴드 TBM 공법 적용성에 미치는 영향

Abstract

Formation of filter cake with little slurry penetration into the tunnel face ground is an essential factor to successfully apply the slurry shield tunnel boring machine (TBM) for tunnelling work. However, when the bentonite slurry is in contact with seawater, it is not easy to guarantee the filter cake formation due to decrease of the swelling volume and viscosity of the slurry. In this study, in order to evaluate the effect of the seawater on the applicability of the slurry shield TBM method, the slurry injection tests were carried out with the variation of seawater percentage contained in the slurry samples as well as the variation of soil types. And then, the effect of these two factors on the slurry clogging phenomena was theoretically and experimentally figure out. As a result, it was found that the value of the slurry clogging criteria (SCC) indicating the applicability of the slurry shield TBM significantly decreases up to 67% as the percentage of seawater increases from 0% up to 20%. In addition, it was found to be necessary to take into account both the characteristics of slurry and soil types together when judging the applicability of the slurry shield TBM method by assessing the slurry penetration characteristics that will occur during tunnelling work.

슬러리 쉴드 TBM (Slurry shield TBM) 공법에서 벤토나이트 슬러리의 침투와 필터 케이크의 형성 여부는 공법의 적용성에 영향을 미치는 중요한 요소이다. 그러나 벤토나이트 슬러리는 해수와 접촉하였을 때 팽윤성과 점도가 저하되어 공법에 대한 적용성을 확보하기 어렵다. 본 연구에서는 해수의 영향에 따른 슬러리 쉴드 TBM 공법의 적용성 변화를 평가하기 위해 슬러리의 해수 비율을 다르게 하여 주입 실험을 수행하였고 해수가 슬러리의 폐색 현상에 미치는 영향을 확인하였다. 그 결과, 해수의 비율이 0%에서 20%까지 증가할수록 폐색 효과에 의한 슬러리 쉴드 TBM 공법의 적용성을 나타내는 slurry clogging criteria (SCC)가 최대 67%까지도 감소하는 것을 확인하였다. 또한 슬러리의 물리적 성질이 동일함에도 지반 조건에 따라 SCC값이 공법 적용에 문제가 없는 수준에서 공법 적용을 위해 슬러리에 추가적인 처리를 요하는 수준으로 변화하는 것을 통해 슬러리 쉴드 TBM의 적용성을 평가할 때 슬러리의 특성뿐만 아니라 지반 조건에 대한 고려도 필요함을 입증하였다.

Fig. 1. Schematic view of slurry and face soil layers (Ryu et al., 2019)

Fig. 2. Flow of small particles through a tube (Reddi and Bonala, 1997)

Fig. 3. One-dimensional flow of slurry (Ryu et al., 2019)

Fig. 4. Estimation of lumped parameter (θ) using slurry sample SL2 and soil sample S1

Fig. 5. Schematic diagram of experimental setup (Ryu et al., 2019)

Fig. 6. Particle size distribution curves of soil samples along with the criteria proposed by Krause (1987)

Fig. 7. Fluid loss curves with variation of seawater percentage contained in slurry

Fig. 8. Fluid loss curves with variation of particle size distribution of soil samples

Table 1. Slurry evaluation items and criteria (Kim et al., 2017)

Table 2. Slurry clogging criteria

Table 3. Physical properties of soil samples

Table 4. Swelling volume of Na-bentonite with variation of seawater percentage

Table 5. Viscosity of slurry with variation of seawater percentage

Table 6. Results of slurry penetration