• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.181-191
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• 2014

This study aims to evaluate cutter acting forces as well as axial stresses and torques in the shaft of two kinds of disc cutters including a single disc cutter and a double disc cutter with the same cutter ring geometry in a series of linear cutting tests. From the tests, the mean values of normal forces and rolling forces acting on the double disc cutter were approximately twice as high as those from the single disc cutter. Similarly, the mean values of axial stresses in the shaft of the double disc cutter were also twice as high as those from the single disc cutter even though the comparisons of torques from two kinds of disc cutters were insignificant since they showed very low values. However, it is necessary to take the durability of a tapered roller bearing used for the double disc cutter into high consideration since the average normal force from the double disc cutter exceeds the allowable force for a disc cutter with the diameter of 432 mm (17 inches). Finally, there is no practical problem in terms of axial stresses in the shaft of the double disc cutter since they are much lower than the yielding stress of the cutter shaft material, even though the axial stresses in the shaft of the double disc cutter are approximately twice as high as those from the single disc cutter.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.103-113
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• 2023

This study focused on understanding the relationship between the design of a tunnel boring machine disc cutter ring and its rock-breaking efficiency, as well as the applicable conditions of different cutter ring types. The discrete element method was used to establish a numerical model of the rock-breaking process using disc cutters with different ring types to reveal the development of rock damage cracks and variation in cutter penetration load. The calculation results indicate that a sharp-edged (V-shaped) disc cutter penetrates a rock mass to a given depth with the lowest load, resulting in more intermediate cracks and few lateral cracks, which leads to difficulty in crack combination. Furthermore, the poor wear resistance of a conventional V-shaped cutter can lead to an exponential increase in the penetration load after cutter ring wear. In contrast, constant-cross-section (CCS) disc cutters have the highest quantity of crack extensions after penetrating rock, but also require the highest penetration loads. An arch-edged (U-shaped) disc cutter is more moderate than the aforementioned types with sufficient intermediate and lateral crack propagation after cutting into rock under a suitable penetration load. Additionally, we found that the cutter ring wedge angle and edge width heavily influence cutter rock-breaking efficiency and that a disc cutter with a 16 to 22 mm edge width and 20° to 30° wedge angle exhibits high performance. Compared to V-shaped and U-shaped cutters, the CCS cutter is more suitable for soft or medium-strength rocks, where the penetration load is relatively small. Additionally, two typical case studies were selected to verify that replacing a CCS cutter with a U-shaped or optimized V-shaped disc cutter can increase cutting efficiency when encountering hard rocks.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2010.03a
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• pp.562-570
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• 2010

This study was conducted to estimate the number of disc cutter consumption and to predict amount of disc cutters when a shield TBM(Tunnel Boring Machine) of the Han Riverbed Tunnel was applied. In fact, it is almost impossible to change the machine after starting the excavation using the shield TBM method. Therefore, it is important to design an appropriate equipment in the shield method - an efficiency choice of the operation equipment plays a key role in the shield tunnel processing. For the above reason, the disc cutter consumption prediction is quite important so that the detailed analysis is required. A number of disc cutter consumption was predicted by the three methods, viz. KOMATSU, MITSUBISHI and NTNU. In addition, the predicted results were compared with field data. The prediction of disc cutter consumption showed that 237 for KOMATSU, 501 for MITSUBISHI, and 634 for NTNU, respectively. However, a total number of 1,263 disc cutter consumption were investigated during the tunnel construction. It was found that there was a huge difference between the predicted and real values of the disc cutter consumption. The more detailed investigation showed that the disc cutter was worn out bluntly in the northbound tunnel, meanwhile it was worn out sharply in the southbound tunnel. In particular, the disc cutter consumption in the southbound tunnel was increased rapidly because of rear abrasion for remaining mucks in the chamber.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.249-258
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• 2022

A disc cutter is an excavation tool on a tunnel boring machine (TBM) cutterhead; it crushes and cuts rock mass while the machine excavates using the cutterhead's rotational movement. Disc cutter wear occurs naturally. Thus, along with the management of downtime and excavation efficiency, abrasioned disc cutters need to be replaced at the proper time; otherwise, the construction period could be delayed and the cost could increase. The most common prediction models for TBM performance and for the disc cutter lifetime have been proposed by the Colorado School of Mines and Norwegian University of Science and Technology. However, design parameters of existing models do not well correspond to the field values when a TBM encounters complex and difficult ground conditions in the field. Thus, this study proposes a series of machine learning models to predict the disc cutter lifetime of a shield TBM using the excavation (machine) data during operation which is response to the rock mass. This study utilizes five different machine learning techniques: four types of classification models (i.e., K-Nearest Neighbors (KNN), Support Vector Machine, Decision Tree, and Staking Ensemble Model) and one artificial neural network (ANN) model. The KNN model was found to be the best model among the four classification models, affording the highest recall of 81%. The ANN model also predicted the wear rate of disc cutters reasonably well.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.225-235
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• 2013

Cutter forces acting on a disc cutter in TBM are the key parameters for TBM design and its performance prediction. This study aimed to experimentally evaluate cutter forces with different ring shapes in a hard rock. The stiffness of a cutter ring was indirectly estimated from a series of full-scale linear cutting tests. From the experiments, it was verified that the rolling stress acting on a V-shape disc cutter was much higher than on a CCS disc cutter even though the penetration depth by a V-shape disc cutter could be increased in the same cutting condition. Finally, it is suggested that a prediction model considering the shape parameters of a disc cutter should be used for its better prediction.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.16 no.6
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• pp.533-542
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• 2014

In this study TBM disc cutter prediction models including Gehring, CSM and NTNU models were investigated and the characteristics of the models were examined. The influence of penetration, uniaxial compressive strength and abrasiveness index on the models was analyzed. The life of disc cutter linearly increases with penetration per revolution and decreases with increasing uniaxial compressive strength of rocks. As the abrasiveness index, CAI, increases, the life of disc cutter in Gehring and CSM model decreases. On the contrary, the life of disc cutter life in NTNU model decreases with increasing CLI. Also, comparisons of predicted disc life were made between models using actual job site data.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.244-254
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• 2023

The disc cutter mounted on the Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) is subjected to cutting forces in three dimensions during rock excavation process. It is widely known that the cutting forces increased with the strength of the rock mass, while the rolling force can be significantly increased when the disc cutter encounters abnormal rotation. Therefore, the cutting force acts on the disc cutter provides important information because it represents the conditions of the rock mass and the disc cutter. For these reasons, several studies have been conducted to measure the cutter forces in real-time. This paper introduces the current status of research on the cutter force measurement of TBM disc cutters, which has been reported in the literature. It is judged that this paper can be a useful reference material when similar technologies are developed in Korea in the future.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.21 no.3
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• pp.151-163
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• 2011

The LCM test is one of the most powerful and reliable methods for designing the disc cutter and for predicting the TBM (Tunnel Boring Machine) performance. It has an advantage to predict the actual load on disc cutter from the laboratory test on the real-size large rock samples, however, it also has a disadvantage to transport and/or prepare the large rock samples and to need an extra cost for experiment. Moreover it is not easy to execute the test for jointed rock mass, and sometimes the design model estimated from the test can not be applied to the real design of disc cutter. In order to break this critical point, lots of numerical studies have been performed. PFC2D can simulate crack propagation and rock fragmentation effectively, because it is useful in particle flow analysis. Consequently, in this study, the PFC2D has been adopted for numerical analysis on cutting power of disc cutter according to the different angle of joint, the different direction of joint, and the different space of joint with jointed rock mass models. From the numerical analyses, it was concluded that the bigger cutting power of disc cutter was needed for reverse cutting direction to joint rather than for forward direction, and the cutting power of disc cutter was increased with decreasing the dip angle of joint and decreasing the space of joints in reverse cutting direction. The more precise numerical model for disc cutter can be developed from comparison between the numerical results and LCM test results, and the resonable guideline is expected for prediction of TBM performance and disc cutter.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.139-152
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• 2008

A series of numerical experiments were carried out to simulate the rock cutting behavior by TBM disc cutter in a given took condition. AUTODYN-3D, a commercial program capable of simulating three-dimensional dynamic failure, was utilized to carry out the numerical tests over four different disc cutter spacing conditions. After modelling three-dimensional geometries of disc cutter and rock specimen, the linear cutting tests by a disc cutter were simulated for eight different types of rocks. The numerical result, that is the optimum cutter spacing for isotropic rocks had the good agreements with those from linear cutting test. However, for relatively anisotropic or jointed rocks, the specific energy obtained from the numerical tests was almost two-times bigger than the real linear cutting results. Therefore, to simulate cutting procedures for anisotropic rocks realistically, further studies would be necessary.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.321-331
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• 2013

This paper describes the evaluation of shield TBM disc cutter penetration depth in practice. In this study the disc cutter penetration depth used to design the excavation speed of tunnel is reviewed. The characteristics of ground encountered in the investigation site are analysed and evaluated. The shield TBM used in the field is reviewed to verify the applicability of machine in the site. The thrust and torque capacities of each TBM disc cutter are also evaluated. Based on the field data, the excavation volume and speed are re-analysed to evaluate the disc cutter penetration depth used in the design stage. It is clearly found that the design value of disc cutter penetration depth needs to modify when estimation of the TBM capacities in very hard rock formation ($S_c$ >150 MPa).