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Geotechnical News • September 2014
www.geotechnicalnews.com
THE GROUT LINE
Paolo Gazzarrini
Overture
Summertime is quite finished so, per-
haps, you will have more time to read
this 36th episode of the Grout Line.
Two main features:
The first is, as every year at this time,
a “classic’’ and brief report of mine
about the Grouting Fundamentals and
Current Practice Course (35th edition),
held at the Colorado School of Mines
in Golden, CO, from June 16 to June
20, 2014.
The second is a very remarkable
article about pre-excavation grouting
at Lake Mead, Las Vegas, NV, which,
not only describes the interesting case-
history related to the grouting, but also
illustrates an unusual use of TBM as
a “packer’’ (bigger than standard!), to
perform permeability tests in rock and
evaluate the seepage of the water in
the tunnel.
35th edition of the Grouting
Fundamentals and Current
Practice course
As previously mentioned, the course
was held at the Colorado School of
Mines, Golden, from June 16 to 20,
2014. An intense week, packed full of
presentations, fruitful discussions and
with new presenters as, for example
Maren Katterbach (Lombardi Engi-
neering), Mike Miluski (Compaction
Grouting Services) and Ken Ivanetich
(Hayward Baker). See the picture of
Scott Kieffer (course leader/orga-
nizer), right, Maren Katterbach, center
and Trevor Carter (instructor), left.
As in every previous year the partici-
pants varied from Agencies to Engi-
neers and Contractors.
As usual the climax of the “grouting
week” was the half day field grout-
ing demonstration, held at Baski Inc,
where everybody is hands-on, with
dirty grouting material, clean grouting
equipment and new grouting instru-
mentation. This year, for the first time,
an Optical Televiewer was demon-
strated in the field.
As I mentioned earlier, the last, but
not least, newcomer Maren, started a
new interesting initiative on LinkedIn,
a Group called “Grouting Fundamen-
tals and Current Practice”. The Group
is intended to serve as a platform
for follow-up discussions involving
participants and instructors, as a gen-
eral discussion platform for grouting
activities, and to promote the course.
All participants from the last 10 years
will soon be invited to join.
I recommend and encourage everyone
interested in grouting to participate!
Here’s the link:
https://www.linkedin.com/groups/
Grouting-Fundamentals-Current-
Practice-GFCP-8127869?home=&gid
=8127869&trk=anet_ug_hm
For next year, the tentative dates for
the Course are June 22-26, 2015.
Please mark your calendars, if you are
interested!
And, as usual, the same request,
asking you to send me your grouting
comments or grouting stories or case
histories. My coordinates are:
Paolo Gazzarrini,
,
or
Ciao! Cheers!
Lake Mead - Intake Tunnel No. 3
Pre-excavation grouting challenges
using a high pressure slurry TBM
Jim Nickerson, Renzo Ceccato, Roberto Bono,
Claudio Cimiotti, Pietro Fioravanti
Introduction
The Lake Mead Intake No.3 project is
located inside the Lake Mead Recre-
ational Area, approximately 30 km
away from the city of Las Vegas in
Nevada, USA. The goal of this project
is the construction of a third intake
Trevor Carter, Maren Katterbach,
Scott Kieffer.