Abstract
Spalling has been recognized as a stress-induced brittle fracture adjacent to the underground openings when tunneling or mining deeply in a hard massive rock mass. Using a database consisting of 29 spalling cases of gneissic granite during the excavation of Qirehataer tunnels, a comprehensive evaluation of rock mass spalling strength, spalling failure depth and the influence of excavation damaged zone (EDZ) and the cross-section shapes is performed and presented. Relationships between the spalling failure depth and the rock mass damage index for D-shape and Horse-shoe shape cross-sections of non-circular tunnels with and without consideration of EDZ are analyzed and discussed. The study found that EDZ has a significant influence on the maximum tangential stress adjacent to the boundary of tunnels that the EDZ has a trend to result in a deeper failure depth than not taking the EDZ into account. The influence degree of EDZ on spalling failure depth could be 1.85 and 2.18 times higher than that without considering EDZ, for the D-shape and Horse-shoe shape tunnels, respectively. Through comparisons with the analysis based on in-situ geophysical testing data, it is found Martin and Christiansson’s method may have a trend to overestimate the spalling failure depth, the overestimation ratio of influence degree may be up to 1.35, and the overestimation becomes more significant with the increase of the rock mass damage index. Based on the analysis and comparisons with different shapes of tunnel cross-sections, it is also found that the D-shape geometry of tunnels has the advantage of avoiding spalling failure over than Horseshoe-shape in the hard and brittle rock mass.
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The datasets generated or used during the study appear in the submitted article. More detailed data are available upon request.
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Acknowledgements
The authors are thankful to Bei Fang Investigation, Design & Research Co. ltd, China for allowing us to use the data collected during the design, research and construction of the project. This study was also partially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No: 51709156). We also express our thanks to Dr. Chao Hu at the China Renewable Energy Engineering Institute, for their insightful discussions.
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This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No: 51709156).
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Material preparation and data collection were performed by GZ when he worked for Bei Fang Investigation, Design & Research Co. Ltd, China. The conception was discussed between DW and GZ, DW, LS and GZ performed analyses for this paper, the project was guided by Sijing Wang and he made comments on conception. The first draft of the manuscript was written by GZ and modified by DW and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Zhao, G., Wang, D., Shi, L. et al. Influences of EDZ and Cross-Section Shapes on Spalling Failure Depth of Non-circular Tunnels in Gneissic Granite. Geotech Geol Eng 41, 91–105 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-022-02264-w
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10706-022-02264-w