A novel steel bulkhead based on the method of prefabrication and assembly and its first application to the Yuliangzhou immersed tunnel

•Existing problems of the existing bulkheads were reviewed.•A new steel bulkhead based on the prefabrication and assembly method was developed.•Structural components of the new steel bulkhead were designed.•Gasketed seam mechanical and sealant behavior was investigated through simulations.•A strategy of installing and dismantling the new steel bulkhead panels was proposed. Temporary bulkheads installed at the end of each tunnel element are indispensable for immersed tunnel elements to be watertight and float. Currently, welded steel bulkheads and cast-in-place concrete bulkheads have been applied in the installation of most immersed tunnels; however, these bulkheads have many inherent drawbacks. For example, existing cast-in-place concrete bulkheads are bulky and cannot be recycled after demolition. In addition, existing welded steel bulkheads, which cannot be fully reused, are installed and dismantled with a large number of on-site welding operations. Relying on the Yuliangzhou Immersed Tunnel in China, a novel steel bulkhead based on the method of prefabrication and assembly, namely, a piece-assembled steel bulkhead, was developed to address the abovementioned problems. The structural components of the new steel bulkhead applied to realize full recycling mainly include steel bulkhead panels, ethylene-propylene-diene-monomer (EPDM) sealing gaskets, steel bearings, and steel connecting bolts. The water tightness function of the new bulkhead was achieved through the compression deformation of the designed EPDM sealing gaskets inside the assembly seams, which were designed as multihole structures to save manufacturing material. Nonlinear finite element simulations were conducted to investigate the gasketed seam mechanical and sealant behavior. It was concluded that the control threshold value of gasketed seam compression displacement needed to satisfy the design requirement for a 250 kPa waterproof capacity could be taken as 15 mm, while that for seam offset displacement was set to 40 mm. To achieve the fast and efficient construction of the new steel bulkhead, a strategy of symmetrically installing and removing steel bulkhead panels piece by piece at one carriageway bore was proposed, and an automatic installation trolley that adjusts the bulkhead panel position in three directions was designed and developed. Finally, the on-site monitoring of the assembly seam displacements and the stress and deformation of the H-shaped steel beam verified that the new ste