100-Year Design Life of Rock Bolts and Shotcrete

R. Bertuzzi
Pells Sullivan Meynink Pty Ltd

ABSTRACT: One of the main technical challenges of underground construction for public space is ensuring
the long-term design life of support components. It is common for owners to specify a 100-year design life.
Can designers, suppliers and constructors guarantee this? A few papers discussing this topic have been pub-
lished over the past decade but as more underground public spaces are being built in Australia, the terms
“permanent rock bolt” and “permanent shotcrete” have come under greater scrutiny. This paper presents the
authors recent experience in relation to providing a permanent rock bolt and shotcrete support.

including sacrificial steel (example NSW RTA’s

1 INTRODUCTION
The trend in tunnel design in Australia is to specify a
100 year design life for permanent support. Often
that support is provided by rock bolts and shotcrete.
Experience with concrete in compression extends
back to Roman times but experience with the lon-
gevity of elements in tension is limited. For exam-
ple, the British Standard BS8081 (Code of Practice
for Ground Anchorages) has been available to guide
the design of permanent rock bolts since the early
1990s.
This paper looks at the projects in Sydney, Austra-
lia undertaken since 1990 and the details of the in-
stalled rock bolts which are supposed to have
equivalent design lives. The term rock bolt is used
here in a generic sense and covers reinforcing ele-
ments comprising bars and strands.
2 DESIGN LIFE
2.1 Rock Bolts
The life expectancy of rock bolts can be addressed
from two viewpoints. The first is to attempt to assess
the probable functional life of a given type of rock
bolt in a given hydrochemical environment. For ex-
ample one may attempt to assess how long a Split-
Set bolt may last in a particular tunnel given knowl-
edge of the groundwater chemistry. This is the ap-
proach typically adopted by the soil anchor industry
by incorporating an allowance for corrosion rate and
specification for the Design of Reinforced Soil
Walls).
The second approach is to attempt to eliminate
uncertainty by developing corrosion protection
measures to provide a substantial level of safety.
This is the approach presented in BS8081, which
suggests permanent rock anchors require double cor-
rosion protection of all components. The intent is
that “in the event of perforation of one of the two
barriers during installation or loading, the remain-
ing barrier must remain intact” (Barley 1997). In
following this path it becomes readily apparent that
attention to detail is critical (Pells & Bertuzzi, 1999).
It is worth noting that BS8081 discounts the use of
sacrificial steel stating it “gives no effective protec-
tion, as corrosion is rarely uniform and extends most
rapidly and preferentially at localised pits or surface
irregularities.”
Table 1 provides a list of recent tunnelling pro-
jects in Sydney and the type and accepted design life
of rock bolt support. A good engineering description
of the rock mass conditions in Sydney is given in
Pells, 2003 and Bertuzzi & Pells, 2002. All that can
be said of the actual durability of the rock bolts used
in these projects is that there have been no failures to
date. Limited over-coring of rock bolts has been car-
ried out and to the author’s knowledge this has been
done on temporary bolts.
Nevertheless, there appears to be an acceptance
by the industry that carbon steel bolts cement
grouted in an open ended plastic sheath are accept-
able for 100 year design life in Sydney tunnels.
Table 1 Permanent Rock Bolts Used in Sydney.
Design
Project Year Permanent Rock Bolt Reference
Life
Opera House Carpark 1990 Epoxy coated steel bolts fully cement grouted in 50 Pells et al, 1991
45mm diameter holes
M2 tunnel 1993 Black steel 24mm diameter bolts fully cement 100 Braybrook,
grouted in 44mm diameter holes 1993
Soil nail structures at 1995 Open ended sheathed black steel M20 bolts fully 100 Project design
Olympic Park & Dev- cement grouted in 45mm diameter holes (CT-Bolts) report
lin St
Wombarra drainage 1997 Black steel 24mm diameter deformed bolts fully 80 to 100 Project design
tunnel chemical resin encapsulation in 27mm diameter report
holes
West Ryde drainage 1998 Black steel 24mm diameter deformed bolts fully 80 to 100 Project design
tunnel chemical resin encapsulation in 27mm diameter report
Eastern Distributor 1998 Epoxy coated steel bolts fully cement grouted in 50 Pells and
tunnel 45mm diameter holes Bertuzzi, 1999
Closed ended sheathed multi-strand cable bolts fully 50
cement grouted in 45mm diameter holes (Freyssi-
bolts)
Stainless steel bolts fully cement grouted in 45mm 75
diameter holes
Bondi pumping cham- 1998 Stainless steel bolts fully cement grouted in 45mm 75 Project design
ber repair diameter holes report
Northside Storage tun- 1999 Fibreglass bolts fully resin encapsulated 100 Asche & Quig-
nel ley, 1999
M5 East tunnel 2000 Open ended sheathed black steel M20 bolts fully 100 Adams et al,
cement grouted in 45mm diameter holes (CT- 2001
Bolts), and open sheathed black steel cable bolts
fully cement grouted in 50mm diameter holes
(MegaBolts)
Cross City tunnel 2003 Partially closed ended sheathed black steel bolts 100 Asche &
with stainless head assembly fully cement grouted Lechner, 2003
in 45mm diameter holes (BBB-Bar)
Epping to Chatswood 2003 Specially designed open ended sheathed multi- 100 Project design
Rail Link station cav- strand cable bolts (MegaBolts) and single strand report
erns cable bolts (CT-Strand)
Open ended sheathed black steel, coarse threaded
steel bar bolts with stainless head assembly fully
cement grouted in 45mm diameter holes (DCP &
CT-Bolt)

2.2 Shotcrete
Concrete technology is applicable to shotcrete. In
the case of the Eastern Distributor a sacrificial
thickness of shotcrete was required because of the
local high acidity of the groundwater chemistry.
No special treatment was required for the other
projects in Sydney. However, a complete water
barrier may be required in groundwater environ-
ments more aggressive than Sydney, which gets us
away from a rock reinforcement design to one of a
passive lining. Shotcrete is not discussed further in
this paper.
3 WHAT ARE THE PROBLEMS NOW
Some of the aspects currently being considered by
tunnel designers are the details relating to the rock
bolt head assemblies, temporary anchorage during
grouting, rupture of plastic sheathing due to ground
movement and final shotcrete cover. Of these the
main issue in the author’s recent experience is the
potential for the plastic sheath to rupture when sub-
jected to tension and shear loading. Design solu-
tions typically offered are based on defining a
maximum value for acceptable movement above
which something must be done, including re-
bolting, multiple stage grouting and the inclusion
of a frangible or compressible grout. It goes with-
out saying that none of these remedial measures are
particularly attractive to the client or the contractor.
4 FAILURE MECHANISM OF ROCK BOLTS
Rock bolts typically fail in tension. It may well be
that the start of the failure was shear movement but
that typically leads to the rock bolt bending, neck-
ing and ultimately tensile failure. The failure in-
volves composite paths: failure along the outer
duct face over a proximal length translating to
group strand failure and thence to multiple individ-
ual strand pull-out of the distal component (Figure
1). This occurrence of progressive debonding is
commonly accepted in the industry.
Figure 1 Encapsulation, group strand and individual strand
failure interfaces (Barley, 2003)
While the rock bolt itself fails in tension, its
corrosion protection may fail much earlier in shear
or actually puncture. A rock bolt can accommodate
a relatively large amount of displacement, both axi-
ally and shear. A cable bolt typically can accom-
modate even more. However, if the object is to
maintain the corrosion protection, then the amount
of deformation that a bolt can be designed to with-
stand is that which ruptures the plastic sheathing.
In other words, in many civil applications high ca-
pacity steel rock bolts are now being designed on
the tolerance of the plastic sheath.
5 EXISITNG EXPERIENCE
5.1 Exhumed Support
Weerasinghe & Anson (1997) investigated the con-
dition of multiple strand cable anchorages after 22
years in a marine environment. The cables com-
prised greased and sheathed free lengths and ce-
ment grouted unsheathed fixed lengths. Interest-
ingly, while there was evidence of general
corrosion there was negligible loss of strand sec-
tion within the single corrosion protection anchor.
The main area affected by corrosion was that
around and immediately beneath the anchor head
that is in the detail where the grease-filled sheath
connects to the stressing head and locking wedges.
This case study suggests that that perhaps BS8081
is too restrictive in dismissing cement grout encap-
sulation as part of a corrosion protection system.
The industry in Australia appears to be of the view
that the cement grout does provide a layer of corro-
sion protection.
During 1997, excavation of a basement at No.2
Bond St Sydney Steel intersected several steel
strand cables that had been installed in 1972. The
cables had been cement grouted in holes drilled
through sandstone. These cables all showed a sign
of corrosion and one was corroded. This case
study suggests that cement grout alone does not
provide long-term corrosion protection.
The European Code EN1537, which partly re-
places BS8081, does allow cement grout to be con-
sidered to be part of the corrosion protection if it is
within a plastic sheath and under working loads the
cracks of the cement grout are less than 0.1mm
width.
5.2 Previous Experiments
Barley (2003) describes results of the relatively
limited testing of sheathed anchors subjected to
shear that have been carried out carried out since
the 1970s in the UK. His observations of the plas-
tic sheaths, made after approximately 37mm of
shear, were that “the sharp edged grout fragments
had severed and torn it (the sheath).” Barley fur-
ther states that as a result of these tests, compliance
with BS8081 has been restricted to axially loaded
anchors, to wit while the concept of axial loading
of curved stands and their corrosion protection
components was recently tried for the Common-
wealth Games Stadium in Manchester, UK, they
were replaced with straight anchors during con-
struction. In underground excavation, it is not pos-
sible to restrict permanent rock bolts to axial loads.
6 CURRENT EXPERIMENTS
6.1 Procedure
This author with his colleagues has carried out lim-
ited shear tests on grout encapsulated plastic ducts.
Two series of tests were carried out.
The first series comprised grouting a 2mm thick
walled corrugated plastic duct within two hollow
steel tubes. The two steel tubes were bolted to-
gether while the duct was grouted. After 7 days,
one of the steel tubes was anchored to the concrete
pavement and a jack was used to push the second
tube to simulated direct shear (refer to Figure 2).
This author has also requested similar tests of bolt
manufacturers. At the time of writing, some of the
tests carried out by bolt manufacturer DSI were
made available (Stevens, 2004).
 The second series of tests was substantially
more sophisticated and involved combined shear
and axial loading of the corrugated plastic duct (re-
fer to Figure 3). This series attempted to simulate
the rock bolt within the rock mass. Two sandstone
blocks separated by 5mm of clay were placed into
a loading frame. Smooth fiberglass strips were lo-
cated on top of the bottom block to ensure the top
block slide smoothly when pushed. A 65mm di-
ameter borehole was drilled through the blocks at
45° angle and a complete rock bolt (steel cable in
this case and corrugated plastic duct) grouted into
place. After 7 days, a jack was used to horizontally
push the top sandstone block 15 to 18mm whilst
restraining vertical movement of the block. The
relative movement of the two blocks was measured
using crack monitor gauge installed on two sides.
Following the test, the bolt was over-cored and in-
spected for damage. In one of the tests the hori-
zontal movement was incrementally advanced; the
test taking a week to reach the 18mm of horizontal
movement.
Figure 2. General layout of the apparatus in the first series of
tests.
6.2 Results
The data suggests that the tested corrugated plastic
ducts are damaged at approximately 15mm of
shear movement. The damage was consistent in all
tests being caused by sharp fragments of broken
grout puncturing the plastic duct. In the tests, little
or no local failure of the sandstone around the
bolthole occurred.
The tests carried out by DSI on their epoxy-
coated cable, which were similar to the first series,
suggest that this product is not damaged until about
20mm of shear movement.
It is acknowledged that the first series of tests
are simplistic because they do not represent the
crushing of the rock; the dilatancy of the joint
plane or the local debonding of the rock bolt; and
hence may be overly aggressive. These shortcom-
ings were partly addressed in the second series of
tests. It is expected that the second series closely
resembles the real case, although the test frame
was too light to assess the influence of bolt pre-
tension.
Figure 3. General layout of the apparatus in the second series
of tests.
Figure 4. Close-up of damaged plastic duct after 15mm of di-
rect shear movement

Figure 5. Close-up of damaged plastic duct subjected to com-
bined shear and axial movement (after 18mm of shear)
Figure 6. DSI's rig for direct shear test
Figure 7. DSI's epoxy coated strand subjected to 23mm of di-
rect shear movement
7 CONCLUSIONS
There appears to have been an acceptance by the
industry that (i) cement grouts alone do not provide
long term corrosion protection for carbon steel; and
(ii) carbon steel bolts cement grouted in a plastic
sheath is acceptable for 100 year design life in Syd-
ney tunnels. However, in order to maintain the cor-
rosion protection, the amount of deformation that a
bolt can be designed to withstand is that which rup-
tures the plastic sheathing. In many civil applica-
tions high capacity steel rock bolts are now being
designed on the tolerance of the plastic sheath.
This author has reviewed the available data and
has carried out limited shear tests on grout encap-
sulated plastic ducts. The data from these tests
suggests that plastic ducts are punctured by sharp
fragments of broken grout at approximately 15mm
of shear movement. DSI carried out basic tests on
their epoxy coated cable which suggest that this
product is not damaged until about 20mm. The
testing frame used was too light to assess the influ-
ence of bolt pre-tension however, further test work
is continuing.
8 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The assistance of Hasan Wijaya, Matt Lowing and
Mark Fowler in carrying out the tests and of Philip
Pells in reviewing this paper is appreciated.
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