Research on Chamber Earth Pressure of EPB Shield Considering Soil Arching Effect

Abstract

Chamber earth pressure is one of the significant parameters during the Earth Pressure Balance (EPB) shield construction processing. The soil arching effect is existence when the tunnel depth is enough. It is significant to consider the influence of arching effect to analyze the pressure in soil chamber in shield tunneling. In this paper, the influence of arching effect is considered to calculate the chamber earth pressure. Firstly, the soil is supposed as loose media, and the necessary buried depth of producing arching affects is deduced according to the loose media theory. Then, based on the characteristic of proper arching axis, the equation and the height of proper arch are obtained. At last, the calculation formula of minimum chamber earth pressure of EPB shield tunnel is deduced which can consider the effect of arching effect.