Repair of the Church of La Purísima Concepción of Huelva (Spain) with Jet Grouting, for damages caused by the construction of diaphragm walls in its proximity

Abstract

The Church of La Purísima Concepcion, raised in 1515 as the second parish of Huelva (Spain) has been affected by diverse natural disasters along its history. The soil of Huelva is mainly mud, very soft and highly compressible. In 1999 the works to build a residential building with four plants below the ground level affected the church and several buildings. Horizontal displacements of the sheet pile wall in top, overcame 12 cm. The settlements were higher to 5 cm. The system of struts, with lengths over to 30 meters used to built the pile wall, was not the best one. Also, the diaphragm walls were designed short, and the dimensions of the element diaphragm wall were incorrect (wide 5 meters). The foundation of the church has been repaired using the technology of jet-grouting, with columns of 15 and of 30 meters of depth and 0.75-0.80 m of diameter. Later, it was realized concrete slab to join all the heads of the columns of jet-grouting. Measurements of levelling have been realized to observe the movements of the church structure during the accomplishment of the jet-grouting.