Instrumentation Installation

Client

Type of work

Instrumentation installation for the Hwy 99 Alaskan Way Viaduct Tunnel Project at several Seattle locations. These instruments monitor any ground movement caused while the tunnel boring machine is boring under the city.

Equipment

Truck mounted drill rigs, track mounted drill rigs, concrete core machines, and vacuum trailers

Description

Installed over 160 slope inclinometers and multi-point extensometers up to 300 feet deep.

Challenges

Urban drilling, rigorous schedule, and complexity of installations.

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Instrumentation Installation 1, Seattle, WA

Drilling in the parking lot of a busy city street.
Tripping out of hole after reaching total depth.
Urban drilling on a busy city street surrounded by Class A commercial buildings.
Monitoring tailings as they are sucked into a vacuum truck keeping the site clean throughout drilling.
Tripping out of the hole after reaching total drilling depth.

Instrumentation Installation 2, Seattle, WA

Drilling using a track-mounted drill rig on a busy urban street.
Tripping out pipe after reaching the drilling depth.
Unscrewing two sections of pipe during the process of removing the pipe from the drilling hole.

Instrumentation Installation 3, Seattle, WA

Description and Challenges

We used a larger rig in order to drill a hole as close to perfectly straight vertically as possible from 0-300 feet. The hole was drilled between an existing horizontal tunnel and future horizontal tunnel which are 6 feet apart horizontally and 130 feet apart vertically. The finished hole was 6 inches off vertical at 300 feet deep. (Considered extremely accurate and a real testament to skilled crew members operating the drill rig in tune with the ground conditions.)

Early morning drilling at one of Seattle’s busiest landmarks typically brimming with pedestrians.
Vacuuming tailings during drilling to keep this popular landmark clean throughout drilling.
Installation of a slope inclinometer.
Running a tool down the hole to measure the verticality of the hole.

Instrumentation Installation 4, Seattle, WA

Description and Challenges

This site, the “launch pit”, is the first stretch for the Alaskan Way Viaduct drilling. It was the most critical and challenging of the drilling sites. The area has the most obstacles in terms of the viaduct drilling and the soil is the most “liquefiable” and unstable. A very experienced drill rig operator is required to drill through the unstable ground and install the instrumentation correctly. This site had a tight schedule so avoiding down-hole complications was critical to complete the drilling and instrumentation installation on-time. In order to qualify to be on this construction site every member of our drilling team completed extensive site specific training. We were pleased to complete our drilling ahead of schedule and injury-free.

Removing drill string after installation of instrumentation.
Carefully extracting tooling from hole after instrumentation installation.
Open hole mud rotary drilling through unconsolidated soil.
We use the right equipment for every job to ensure we get the job done right and finish on schedule.
Ready to wrap up the job. Mission accomplished ahead of schedule!