Experimental study of an innovative driven and grouted soil nail (x-Nail)

This paper describes an experimental investigation of a newly developed driven and grouted soil nail (x-Nail), which combines the capabilities of a purely frictional driven nail and a compaction-grouted nail. The innovative design allows the x-Nail to be driven into the ground with a latex balloon attached that is used subsequently for compaction grouting. A grout bulb is thus formed at the driven end of the nail to improve its pull-out resistance. For compaction grouting, a special type of additive-mixed cement grout was used in this investigation because of its zero bleeding and high bond strength. A series of pullout model tests was conducted to examine the performance of the x-Nail compared to a purely frictional soil nail. It was found that more than 90% of the pullout force of the x-Nail was resisted by the expanded grout bulb and the end bearing resistance of the grout bulb increased with the increment of the injected grout volumes. The experimental results revealed that the pullout force of the x-Nail increased approximately 1800%, 1550%, 1200% and 900% compared to the purely frictional soil nail for the injected grout volumes of about 350 ml, 270 ml, 220 ml, and 170 ml, respectively.The accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author