• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.871-885
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• 2017

Nowadays, the construction of tunnels with a shallow depth drastically in urban areas increases. But the effect of sidewall displacement in shallow tunnel on its behavior is not well known yet. Most studies on the shallow tunnel have been limited to the stability and the failure of the tunnel and the adjacent ground in plane strain state. Therefore, the model tests were conducted in a model ground which was built with carbon rods, in order to investigate the impact of the tunnel sidewall displacement on the lateral load transfer to the adjacent ground. The lateral displacement of the tunnel sidewall and the load transfered to the adjacent ground were measured in model tests for various overburdens (0.50D, 0.75D, 1.00D, 1.25D). As results, if the cover depth of tunnel was over a constant depth (0.75D) in a shallow tunnel, the tunnel sidewall was failed with a constant shape not depending on the tunnel cover depth and also not affected by the opposite side of the wall. But, if the cover depth of tunnel was under a constant depth (0.75D), the failure of the tunnel sidewall could affect the opposite sidewall. In addition, if the displacement of tunnel sidewall with 50% of the critical displacement occurred, the tunnel failure was found to be at least 75%. However, additional studies are deemed necessary, since they may differ depending on the ground conditions.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.399-410
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• 2020

Cavities often develop behind the vault during the construction of double-arch tunnels, generally in the form of various defects. The study evaluates the impact of cavities behind the vault on the mechanical and failure behaviors of double-arch tunnels. Cavities of the same sizes are introduced at the vault and the shoulder close to the central wall of double-arch tunnels. Physical model tests are performed to investigate the liner stress variation, the earth pressure distribution and the process of progressive failure. Results reveal that the presence of cavities behind the liner causes the re-distribution of the earth pressure and induces stress concentration near the boundaries of cavities, which results in the bending moments in the liner inside the cavity to reverse sign from compression to tension. The liner near the invert becomes the weak region and stress concentration points are created in the outer fiber of the liner at the bottom of the sidewall and central wall. It is suggested that grouting into the foundation soils and backfilling injection should be carried out to ensure the tunnel safety. Changes in the location of cavities significantly impact the failure pattern of the liner close to the vault, e.g., cracks appear in the outer fiber of the liner inside the cavity when a cavity is located at the shoulder close to the central wall, which is different from the case that the cavity locates at the vault, whereas changes in the location of cavities have a little influence on the liner at the bottom of the double-arch tunnels.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.13 no.6
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• pp.501-517
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• 2011

In general, the tunnel stability during excavation is assessed by comparing measured displacements at roof and sidewall to control criteria. The control criteria were established based on the past experience that considered ground conditions, size of the tunnel cross section, construction method, supports, etc. Therefore, a number of researches on the control criteria using the critical strain have been conducted. However, the critical strain obtained from uniaxial compression tests have drawbacks of not taking damage in rock mass due to increase of stress level and longitudinal arching into account. In this paper, damage-controlled tests simulating stress level and longitudinal arching during tunnel excavation were carried out in addition to uniaxial compression tests to investigate the critical strain characteristics of granite and gneiss that are most abundant rock types in Korean peninsula. Then, the critical strains obtained from damage-controlled tests were compared to those from uniaxial compression tests; the former showed less values than the latter. These results show that the critical strain obtained from uniaxial compression tests has to be reduced a little bit to take stress history during tunnel excavation into account. Moreover, the damage critical strain was proposed to be used for assessment of the brittle failure that usually occurs in deep tunnels.