Experimental Study on Usability of Friction Rockbolts with Plastic Bodies


Komurlu E., KESİMAL A.

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF GEOMECHANICS, vol.17, no.9, 2017 (SCI-Expanded) identifier identifier

Abstract

In this study, rockbolts made of polypropylene random copolymer (PP-R) material, instead of the steel split sets, were assessed with a series of experimental studies including both laboratory-and field-scale tests. PP-R tubes and typical steel split sets were comparatively investigated by performing static loading (pull and shear), impact loading, corrosion, diametric compression, insertion into drill holes, and creep tests. PP-R tubes with good chemical resistivity and mechanical properties that are economically used in drinking water and pressurized gas transportation were assessed to be usable as frictional rockbolts in rock engineering. Despite the advantages of being a noncorrosive material, being shaped by the roughness of drill hole surfaces, and having ideal support reactions because of high crack propagation resistivity, strain relaxation was found to be considerable for the PP-R tubes inserted into the drill holes. Results obtained from this study suggest developing new bolts when using PP-R tubes instead of using the steel split sets. (C) 2017 American Society of Civil Engineers.