Pressure Regulation for Earth Pressure Balance Control on Shield Tunneling Machine by Using Adaptive Robust Control

Most current studies about shield tunneling machine focus on the construction safety and tunnel structure stability during the excavation. Behaviors of the machine itself are also studied, like some tracking control of the machine. Yet, few works concern about the hydraulic components, especially the pressure and flow rate regulation components. This research focuses on pressure control strategies by using proportional pressure relief valve, which is widely applied on typical shield tunneling machines. Modeling of a commercial pressure relief valve is done. The modeling centers on the main valve, because the dynamic performance is determined by the main valve. To validate such modeling, a frequency-experiment result of the pressure relief valve, whose bandwidth is about 3 Hz, is presented as comparison. The modeling and the frequency experimental result show that it is reasonable to regard the pressure relief valve as a second-order system with two low corner frequencies. PID control, dead band compensation control and adaptive robust control（ARC） are proposed and simulation results are presented. For the ARC, implements by using first order approximation and second order approximation are presented. The simulation results show that the second order approximation implement with ARC can track 4 Hz sine signal very well, and the two ARC simulation errors are within 0.2 MPa. Finally, experiment results of dead band compensation control and adaptive robust control are given. The results show that dead band compensation had about 30° phase lag and about 20% off of the amplitude attenuation. ARC is tracking with little phase lag and almost no amplitude attenuation. In this research, ARC has been tested on a pressure relief valve. It is able to improve the valve＇s dynamic performances greatly, and it is capable of the pressure control of shield machine excavation.

Energy saving analysis of segment positioning in shield tunneling machine considering assembling path optimization

A motion parameter optimization method based on the objective of minimizing the total energy consumption in segment positioning was proposed for segment erector of shield tunneling machine. The segment positioning process was decomposed into rotation, lifting and sliding actions in deriving the energy calculation model of segment erection. The work of gravity was taken into account in the mathematical modeling of energy consumed by each actuator. In order to investigate the relationship between the work done by the actuator and the path moved along by the segment, the upward and downward directions as well as the operating quadrant of the segment erector were defined. Piecewise nonlinear function of energy was presented, of which the result is determined by closely coupled components as working parameters and some intermediate variables. Finally, the effectiveness of the optimization method was proved by conducting a case study with a segment erector for the tunnel with a diameter of 3 m and drawing comparisons between different assembling paths. The results show that the energy required by assembling a ring of segments along the optimized moving path can be reduced up to 5%. The method proposed in this work definitely provides an effective energy saving solution for shield tunneling machine.

Examining the effect of adverse geological conditions on jamming of a single shielded TBM in Uluabat tunnel using numerical modeling

Severe shield jamming events have been reported during excavation of Uluabat tunnel through adverse geological conditions, which resulted in several stoppages at advancing a single shielded tunnel boring machine(TBM). To study the jamming mechanism, three-dimensional(3D) simulation of the machine and surrounding ground was implemented using the finite difference code FLAC3D. Numerical analyses were performed for three sections along the tunnel with a higher risk for entrapment due to the combination of overburden and geological conditions. The computational results including longitudinal displacement contours and ground pressure profiles around the shield allow a better understanding of ground behavior within the excavation. Furthermore, they allow realistically assessing the impact of adverse geological conditions on shield jamming. The calculated thrust forces, which are required to move the machine forward, are in good agreement with field observations and measurements. It also proves that the numerical analysis can effectively be used for evaluating the effect of adverse geological environment on TBM entrapments and can be applied to prediction of loads on the shield and preestimating of the required thrust force during excavation through adverse ground conditions.

Optimal design of structural parameters for shield cutterhead based on fuzzy mathematics and multi-objective genetic algorithm

In order to improve the strength and stiffness of shield cutterhead, the method of fuzzy mathematics theory in combination with the finite element analysis is adopted. An optimal design model of structural parameters for shield cutterhead is formulated,based on the complex engineering technical requirements. In the model, as the objective function of the model is a composite function of the strength and stiffness, the response surface method is applied to formulate the approximate function of objective function in order to reduce the solution scale of optimal problem. A multi-objective genetic algorithm is used to solve the cutterhead structure design problem and the change rule of the stress-strain with various structural parameters as well as their optimal values were researched under specific geological conditions. The results show that compared with original cutterhead structure scheme, the obtained optimal scheme of the cutterhead structure can greatly improve the strength and stiffness of the cutterhead, which can be seen from the reduction of its maximum equivalent stress by 21.2%, that of its maximum deformation by 0.75%, and that of its mass by 1.04%.

Theoretical model for loads prediction on shield tunneling machine with consideration of soil-rock interbedded ground

The loads acting on shield tunneling machines are basic parameters for the equipment design as well as key control parameters throughout the entire operation of the equipment. In the study, a mechanical analysis for the coupled interactive system between the cutterhead and the ground at the excavation face is conducted. The normal and tangential loads acting on the cutterhead are decoupled and solved, with consideration of the influence of three key factors on loads: geological condition, operating status and equipment structure. Then analytical expressions for the thrust and the torque acting on the equipment under uniform geological condition are established. On this basis, the impact of soil-rock interbedded ground on acting loads is further considered. A theoretical model for loads prediction of earth pressure balance (EPB) shield machines working under soil-rock interbedded ground is proposed. This model is subsequently applied to loads prediction for a shield tunneling project under soil-rock interbedded ground. The computational value of the thrust and the torque, the measured loads and the load ranges from Krause empirical formula are compared. Thus, this model for loads prediction acting on shield tunneling machines under soil-rock interbedded ground has been proved to be effective.

Compliance of hydraulic system and its applications in thrust system design of shield tunneling machine

As the most significant performance, compliance of hydraulic system is defined as the capacity to accommodate the sudden change of the external load. Due to the different requirements of the compliant tasks, the existing method for mechanical systems cannot be used in the analysis and design of the hydraulic system. In this paper, the definition and expression of compliance of hydraulic system are proposed to evaluate the compliance of the hydraulic system operating under sudden change load. Because the unexpected geological conditions during excavation may exert sudden change load to the shield tunneling machine, the compliance theory has found a right application in the thrust hydraulic system. By analyzing the basic operating principle and the commonly used architectures of the thrust hydraulic system, a compliance based thrust hydraulic system design method is presented. Moreover, a tunneling case is investigated in the paper as an example to expound the validation of design procedure. In conclusion, the compliance of the hydraulic system can be served as an evaluation of the capability in conforming to the load impact, giving supports for the design of the thrust hydraulic system of shield tunneling machines.

A novel LSTM-autoencoder and enhanced transformer-based detection method for shield machine cutterhead clogging

Shield tunneling machines are paramount underground engineering equipment and play a key role in tunnel construction.During the shield construction process,the“mud cake”formed by the difficult-to-remove clay attached to the cutterhead severely affects the shield construction efficiency and is harmful to the healthy operation of a shield tunneling machine.In this study,we propose an enhanced transformer-based detection model for detecting the cutterhead clogging status of shield tunneling machines.First,the working state data of shield machines are selected from historical excavation data,and a long short-term memory-autoencoder neural network module is constructed to remove outliers.Next,variational mode decomposition and wavelet transform are employed to denoise the data.After the preprocessing,nonoverlapping rectangular windows are used to intercept the working state data to obtain the time slices used for analysis,and several time-domain features of these periods are extracted.Owing to the data imbalance in the original dataset,the k-means-synthetic minority oversampling technique algorithm is adopted to oversample the extracted time-domain features of the clogging data in the training set to balance the dataset and improve the model performance.Finally,an enhanced transformer-based neural network is constructed to extract essential implicit features and detect cutterhead clogging status.Data collected from actual tunnel construction projects are used to verify the proposed model.The results show that the proposed model achieves accurate detection of shield machine cutterhead clogging status,with 98.85%accuracy and a 0.9786 F1 score.Moreover,the proposed model significantly outperforms the comparison models.

A stiffness-matching based evaluation approach for compliance of mechanical systems in shield tunneling machines

As the most important performance,compliance of shield tunneling machines(STM) is defined as the capability to accommodate the sudden change of the load induced by the variable geological conditions during excavation.Owing to the different requirements of the compliant tasks,the existing methods in the robotic field cannot be utilized in the analysis and design of the mechanical system of shield tunneling machines.In this paper,based on the stiffness of the mechanical system and the equivalent contact stiffness of the tunnel face,the tunneling interface-matching index(IMI) is proposed to evaluate the compliance of the machine.The IMI is defined as a metric to describe the coincidence of the stiffness curves of the mechanical system and the tunnel face.Moreover,a tunneling case is investigated in the paper as an example to expound the validation of IMI and the analytical process.In conclusion,the IMI presented here can be served as an appraisement of the capability in conforming to the load fluctuation,and give instructions for the design of the thrust system of shield tunneling machines.

Heat Treatment Properties of 42CrMo Steel for Bearing Ring of Varisized Shield Tunneling Machine

The heat treatment properties of 42CrMo steel for bearing ring of varisized shield tunneling machine were investigated by optical microscope （OM）, scanning electron microscope （SEM）, transmission electron microscope （TEM）, and impact tests. The addition of 0.03 wt% C into 42CrMo steel can increase the hardness. But it reduces the impact energy by 46 J because of the appearance of coarser carbides in the matrix and the carbides along the austenite grain boundary. The addition of 0.40 wt% Mn into 42CrMo steel can improve hardenability. However, the toughness of steel is also reduced by 26 J mainly because of the coarsening of carbides and the strengthening of matrix. Both hardenability and toughness of 42CrMo steel can be improved by adding 1.49 wt% Ni and reducing 0.32 wt% Cr. The depth of hardening layer can be raised to 45 mm, and the impact energy at -20 ℃ is 120 J. Thus, it is concluded that a good combination of hardness, hardenability, and toughness of 42CrMo steel can be achieved by alloying with adding some content of C and Ni. Detailed content of C and Ni should be on the requirements of heat treatment properties of steel for bearing ring of varisized shield tunneling machine.

Method to avoid the structural interference of the thrust system of a shield tunneling machine

Several malfunctions of the shield tunneling machine （STM） caused by structural interference have been encountered in actual tunnel excavation. This paper is focusing on providing an effective method to avoid the structural interference based on making the reachable and the required workspaces of the thrust system match each other. The main structure of the thrust mechanism is analyzed, and coordinate systems are built up to describe the pose and workspace of the thrust mechanism. Constraint conditions are derived and the formulation of each constraint condition is carried out to facilitate the analysis of the reachable workspace of the thrust mechanism. Meanwhile, a reachable workspace determination algorithm is introduced based on interval analysis method. The mathematical model for determining the required workspace of the thrust mechanism is presented based on the analysis of the process when the STM excavates along a specific tunnel axis. Two applications are included to show how to avoid these problems by choosing reasonable parameters of the designed tunnel axis and the key structural parameters of the thrust mechanism based on workspace matching.

A new calculation model of cutterhead torque and investigation of its influencing factors

Cutterhead torque is a crucial parameter for the design and operation of earth pressure balance （EPB） shield tunneling machine. However, the traditional calculation models of cutterhead torque are too rough or exist gross errors under variable geological conditions. In order to improve the precision of the calculation model of cutterhead torque, dynamic operation parameters are considered and a new model is proposed. Experiment is carried out on a ~1.8 m shield machine test rig and the calculating re- sult with the new model is compared with the experimental data to verify the validity of the new model. The relative error of the new model is as low as 4% at smooth stage and is reduced to 5% at the end of trembling stage. Based on the results of the new model and the test data obtained from the 001.8 m test rig and the construction site, the inner relationships between several operation parameters and cutterhead torque are investigated and some quantitative conclusions are obtained.