ABSTRACT
TBM tunneling in soft ground requires careful planning and execution in terms of excavation performance and cutting tool life. It is because these are affected by many parameters including ground conditions, TBM operational parameters, and soil conditioning. Soil abrasion and penetration test (SAPT) is a newly developed device to simulate EPB TBM excavation process in a small scale to evaluate the excavation performance and the abrasion of cutting tools considering the soil conditioning under chamber pressure. Major issues discussed in this paper include the introduction to the new test, its working procedure, parametric study regarding the influential parameters, and finally the draft correlation among the test results and the operational parameters.
