• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.17 no.6
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• pp.637-652
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• 2015

In the present work, a number of three-dimensional (3D) parametric numerical analyses have been carried out to study the influence of tunnelling on the behaviour of adjacent piles considering the transverse distance of the pile tip from the tunnel. Single piles and $5{\times}5$ piles inside a group with a spacing of 2.5d were considered, where d is the pile diameter. In the numerical modelling, several key issues, such as the tunnelling-induced pile settlements, the interface shear stresses, the relative shear displacements, the axial pile forces, the apparent factors of safety and zone of influence have been rigorously analysed. It has been found that when the piles are inside the influence zone, the pile head settlements are increased up to about 111% compared to those computed from the Greenfield condition. Larger pile settlements and smaller axial pile forces are induced on the piles inside the pile groups than those computed from the single piles since the piles responded as a block with the surrounding ground. Also tensile pile forces are induced associated with the upward resisting skin friction at the upper part of pile and the downward acting skin friction at the lower part of pile. On the contrary, when the piles were outside the influence zone, tunnelling-induced compressive pile forces developed. Based on computed load and displacement relation of the pile, the apparent factor of safety of the piles was reduced up to about 45%. Therefore the serviceability of the piles may be substantially reduced. The pile behaviour, when considering the single piles and the pile groups with regards to the influence zone, has been analysed by considering the key features in great details.