Logging
Logging
The Tough Cell cellular confinement system (CCS) is designed to specifically address the challenges related to forest road reinforcement and construction, through the ability to build all weather sustainable logging roads. With Tough Cell, forest service roads can be quickly built on any terrain and exceed any other solution in durability, with minimal maintenance requirements. The installation process of logging roads is fast, simple, does not require sacrificing part of the timber to build log roads, and can be performed by small work crews in all weather conditions – all year round. The infill material can be successfully constructed from free draining soils or other available local materials, with minimal need for subgrade excavation.
In forestry areas, when constructing logging roads, minimizing the environmental footprint is more important than ever. It becomes necessary not to interrupt animal habitats and diminish both visual and environmental impact. Rutting by heavy logging vehicles is minimized by the reinforced gravel surface logging roads in deforestation watershed areas are prevented from causing sedimentation plumes in adjacent water bodies. The Tough Cell solution can be used to construct long lasting and easily maintainable logging roads as well as forest service roads and log yards.
Benefits
Cost Effective
Reduced maintenance costs throughout the lifecycle, longer life span, reduced labor, fuel and haulage costs make Tough Cell the most cost-effective option across the industry. This is in addition to construction savings resulting from the use of local materials and reduced tire wear and tear.
Installation
Fast and simple deployment, all weather installation.
Engineering
The Tough Cell structure allows the use of most soil types as infill and is durable under heavy loads. Graveled surfaces prevent rutting even under heavy logging vehicle loads.
Environmental
Tough Cell has a minimized footprint and prevents sedimentation run-off, enables better visual esthetics as well as landscape rehabilitation, making it a sustainable green solution.
Mining
Mining
Mines rely on haul roads and truck transportation. Tough Cell offers various long-lasting soil stabilization solutions for mining applications, including haul road construction and reinforcement, mining site rehabilitation and the reinforcement of waste stacks.
Tough Cell is structurally designed to sustain heavy loads for 600+ ton haul trucks and provides sufficient bearing capacity – for this weight – even over soft soils. The confinement system created by Tough Cells produces a beam effect that distributes the load equally over a larger area, providing strong surface adhesion, all while diminishing dust dispersion. Haul road durability also has a positive effect on the vehicle fleet, including the reduction of tire wear and tear, and the insurance of continuous and safer operations. The Tough Cell solution can be utilized to construct both temporary roadways and permanent roadways for all mine site needs.
Mine waste containment – A combination of Tough Cell with geomembranes can construct an impervious impoundment for mine waste with several infill possibilities according to containment needs: concrete (liquids), gravel (leachate treatment), and topsoil (landscaping).
Earth retention – Retaining walls can be utilized for crack prevention, erosion control and for surface water mining diversions – even in saturated subgrades. Using Tough Cell improves drainage capabilities and sustainability under hydrostatic forces, while enabling vegetation growth for a green solution.
Slope protection – Used for steep slope mine reinforcement and dry waste containment to prevent sliding due to gravitational forces, Tough Cell ensures mine safety, while preventing erosion and enabling green vegetation growth.
Mine Rehabilitation
Tough Cell is the perfect solution for abandoned mine site rehabilitation due to different construction possibilities enabling earth stabilization and landfill geomembrane protection. The permanent roadways to the deserted site usually need substantial maintenance and reinforcement, while construction of new temporary roadways is required for hauling heavy equipment during the rehabilitation process. All these applications are offered with the Tough Cell solution in a cost-effective manner and with the ability for rapid installation.
Tough Cell’s unique frictional resistance, coupled with the soil-cell interlock effect, ensures mine wall strength for up to 75 years. This includes non-degradable performance with diminished maintenance needs.
Benefits
Cost Effective
Reduced maintenance costs throughout the lifecycle, longest design life, reduced wear and tear on hauling fleet and initial construction savings with use of local materials results in the market’s leading cost-effective solution for mines.
Installation
Fast and simple deployment, all weather installation - all year round.
Engineering
The Tough Cell structure allows the use of most soil types as infill and is durable under very heavy loads. In mine rehabilitation applications, Tough Cell perforations create a root interlock effect further stabilizing soil mass.
Environmental
An overall green solution. Improves ecological properties with soil conservation, better water flow management and vegetation growth. Enables better visual esthetics and is a non-corrosive solution for containment ponds.
Emergency Infrastructure and Military
Emergency Infrastructure and Military
Restoration After Emergency
During times of emergency, particularly after a natural disaster hits, it is essential to maintain accessibility via roads, airports and ports, among others; this is due to the critical need of permitting aid delivery as well as the reconstruction of damaged areas. Restoring critical infrastructure is an objective that needs to be launched quickly and safely. Using the Tough Cell solution offers minimal logistics as well as the advantage of using local materials during time of necessity as a swiftly implemented and active construction process.
Whether repairing existing access or creating new ones, the Tough Cell technology can be installed by small teams, consisting of local labor that can make use of any suitable soil type. All critical infrastructure can be constructed in the same manner; this includes, but is not limited to, access roads, flood protection walls, earth retention, landing strips and more.
Benefits
Reinforcement
This technology enables the remediation of failed slopes, flood retention walls and access roads as well as the construction of walls and secure routes for rescue teams.
Installation
Tough Cell enables the ability to create and initiate repairs to emergency critical infrastructures. This includes the execution of renewed access through any available soil type in which the environment is created. Simple installation allows the use of local personnel.
Military Roads and Applications
Based on cellular confinement or geocell technology, originally made of HDPE and created for military applications with strictest guidelines and procedures, Tough Cell, fabricated from Neoloy polymer, allows for the fast construction of military roads that must be very strong, reliable and durable, all while sustaining constant heavy loads and stress. In addition, the challenge is to construct highly durable roads with minimal logistics. By using any available granular material and the reduction of layer thickness and due to its foldable sections, Tough Cell enables simple and inexpensive transportation, as well allows for fast installation of long lasting and safe roads. All these make Tough Cell the number one solution for best ground improvement for military applications.
These roads are designed to be secure routes that can even safeguard troops from hostile tampering by preventing the laying of IEDs (Improvised Explosive Device).
This solution was proven time and time again in military applications. The UK MOD (Ministry of Defense) chose Tough Cell geocells as its preferred solution for road construction and ground improvement. For example:
TRIDENT patrol route construction, Afghanistan – This reinforced, unpaved patrol road is reliable, cost-efficient and saves lives by preventing the use of IEDs. Securing this route helped British troops establish area control as well as the capability to move swiftly and efficiently. The route was built under fire by using local sand as infill. It exceeded expectations by securing a patrol route, all while laying the foundation for civilian reconstruction projects.
Major Adam Foley, Commanding Officer, 64 HQ & Support Squadron: “Blazing a Trail in Helmand Province, Ahead of Schedule, under Budget and under Fire”, New Civil Engineer (NCE) journal, 7 July 2010.
Yet, the solution does not stop there. Tough Cell further provides the ability to erect retaining walls that can be utilized as protective barriers for troops, bases, ammunition storage and other sensitive facilities.
As stated, the original design by the US Corps of Engineers and use of geocells was facilitated in the army. ed. The current expanded use of the Neoloy based Tough Cell solution in military applications closes the loop and fulfills the vision in a way that was once unimaginable.
Benefits
Cost-Effective
The use of locally available granular materials, pavement thickness reduction, simple logistics, fast installation and low equipment costs, as well as less maintenance requirements, guarantee lower project costs
Engineering
Neoloy based Tough Cell is durable and provides structural strength by improving the layer modulus. Honeycomb structure enables the detection of IEDs.
Installation
Fast and simple transportation and storage logistics due to Tough Cell section's foldable design, year-round, all weather/ terrain construction, in parallel with the advantage of using locally available soils for construction and fortification – make Tough Cell based military roads building simple, fast, efficient and reliable.
Sustainability and Security
Maintains structural integrity in extreme temperatures (-40° to +60°C) and heavy loads such as armored vehicles.
Contact Us
CONTACT US
Want to use Tough Cell in your next project?
For full engineering and contractor services – please contact Paradox Access Solutions, Master Distributor of Tough Cell in North America- https://www.
Technical Info
Tough Cell Technical Info
Tough Cell is a high-performance geocell, structured in a 3D honeycomb formation of polymeric material. The Tough Cell cellular confinement system ensures equal load distribution, increases the pavement layer strength and reinforces the infill material of low strength and easily sourced aggregates such as sand, local soils or recycled materials. Tough Cell Geocells are fabricated from a new Novel Polymeric Alloy called Neoloy®; specifically developed for geocells that have been found superior in comparison to any other geocell or cellular confinement product. Tough Cell allows you to build more durable roads, while reducing up to 60% of your project’s Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).
Tough Cell strips are welded together to form a honeycomb-like polymeric cell section which are laid out and filled with granular infill, creating a reinforced composite “mattress” used for versatile soil stabilization and reinforcement applications including municipal paved and unpaved roads, access roads, heavy haul roads, mining roads, railroads, container and heavy equipment yards, slopes, channels, retaining walls and landscaping. This technology is the preferred choice in a multitude of industrial market sectors including oil and gas, logging, mining, military, and other soil reinforcement projects especially on soft soils, peats, expansive clays and permafrost.
Tough Cell has a patterned structure of geocells designed to distribute vertical load upon a larger area, therefore reduce the strain on one spot and maximize the load bearing capacity of the structure This mechanism is referred to as "the beam effect". When loading vertically on top of the geocell, a semi-rigid slab is formed over the soft soil, distributing the load evenly and decreasing the stress to the subgrade. This effect was carefully and vastly tested at the University of Kansas and the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.
Tough Cell Beam Effect
The first cellular confinement systems were developed by the US Corps of Engineers for tactical military use. The initial 3D honeycomb grids were made from aluminum and its purpose was to distribute vertical loads and improve the bearing capacity of soft soils by using materials like the sand in beachheads as infill and create temporary passageways for military vehicles and supplies. In the late 1970's, the aluminum was replaced by high density polyethylene (HDPE) polymer due to its relatively moderate cost and the flexibility it afforded in packaging the materials for shipment and in their deployment in the field. Road reinforcement applications required a solution with proven long-term durability, suitable for continuous heavy load stresses that are common in busy highways, railways ports and airports.
In 2005, a visionary R&D program was undertaken to compound a nano-polymeric engineering alloy to meet the long-lasting performance required for public transportation and DOT applications. The result was Neoloy®- a Novel Polymeric Alloy (NPA) of polyester/polyamide nano-fibers dispersed in a polyethylene matrix, developed to improve the long-term stiffness and Long Term Dimensional Stability (LTDS) of the geocell. Neoloy is a nano-technology material that combines the ductility of polyethylene with the stability and resistance of polyamides, manufactured under patented processes.
Cell dimensional stability behavior in temperature changes
Confining soil in the Tough Cell honeycomb like geometry is what leads to a strong structure even when using soft soils.
Load distribution showing the effect of cellular confinement with and without Neoloy Geocell
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What is Tough Cell?
Tough Cell is a unique cellular confinement system or “geocell” for soil stabilization and reinforcement that enables cost-saving and sustainable road construction on challenging and problematic soils.
Tough Cell allows you to build lower-cost, sustainable roads, all year long, while reducing up to 50% of your project’s cost and duration. Tough Cell is fabricated from Neoloy, a novel nano-polymeric alloy which maintains its dimensional stability in a wide variation of temperatures (-60⁰ to +60⁰), under dynamic and cyclic loadings, and is highly resistant to polymeric creep. Extensive, worldwide project experience and a deep understanding of geotechnical engineering and the working mechanisms of cellular confinement technology are key factors in combining this innovative and cost-saving technology with established and accepted design methodologies for innovation application and successful projects.
Where Can You Use Tough Cell?
Tough Cell is the strongest and most durable geocell, suitable for load support, steep slope stabilization and earth retention applications in wide variety of markets- public transportation, government, oil and gas, emergency infrastructures, military, mining, logging, railways, airports and many more. Typical large-scale projects require combined applications and solutions for flexible pavements, roadway construction, access road construction, soil stabilization, slope/channel protection, embankments, gravel roads and retaining walls. Tough Cell offers a comprehensive solution for most infrastructure projects while setting a new standard in the world of access road construction, soil reinforcement and ground improvement. When dealing with complex projects and multiple challenges, Tough Cell has cost effective solutions that significantly reduce road repair, maintenance, use of virgin aggregate materials and roadway construction time.
Benefits
Tough Cell Neoloy Geocells contribute proven benefits to road construction and soil reinforcement stabilization. This innovative yet proven technology enables great improvements both in economic and engineering aspects that lead to unmatchable cost-effective solutions.
Cost Reduction
Use of local infills, reduced transportation costs due to Tough Cell's foldable properties, long term durability and low maintenance needs, fast installation with local work crews and all-weather installation, versatile project adaptation according to specific needs.
Non-Cohesive Local Infill Materials
Tough Cell does not require transporting costly aggregate to distant project sites and enables the use of non-cohesive locally available infills (sand, RAP, and recycled materials).
Less Structural Layers
Tough Cells’ stiffness, passive resistance of the geocell mattress and the “Beam Effect” working mechanism help increased subgrade strength result in less vertical stress, enabling layer thickness optimization in structural support for road construction. Optimized layer thickness means lower material and infill costs, as well as faster installation.
Sustainability
The combination of geotechnical structure and the Neoloy material in the Tough cell solution enables project lifecycle extension of up to 75 years.
Easy Deployment, Fast Installation
Transportation needs in means of space and weight are reduced, road construction time is made cost-effective and can be done with any locally found soil in any weather conditions.
Green Solution
The ability to incorporate and foster vegetation growth, reduction in the need for chemical stabilizers and the reduction of aggregate consumption, hauling and construction machine time enable achievement of a significantly reduced carbon and environmental footprint while maintaining an aesthetic landscape.
2,507,287
Square meters of Tough Cell applied
50%
Approximate overall project cost reduction
75
Tough Cell product, workmanship and performance warranty in years
600+ tons
Loads that Tough Cell is structurally designed to sustain and provide sufficient bearing capacity for
Technical Information
Tough Cell is a high-performance geocell made from Neoloy and structured into a 3D honeycomb formation. This cellular confinement system ensures more cost-effective roadway construction , better load and stress distribution by increasing the pavement’s layer strength.
Beam Effect
When vertical loading is subjected to the Tough Cell mattress, a semi-rigid slab or “Beam Effect” is formed over the soft soil, distributing the load more evenly and decreasing the stresses transmitted to the subgrade.
Neoloy
A Novel Polymeric Alloy (NPA) of polyester/polyamide nano-fibers dispersed in a polyethylene matrix, developed to improve the long-term stiffness and Long Term Dimensional Stability (LTDS) of the geocell. Neoloy is a nano-technology material that combines the ductility of polyethylene with the stability and resistance of polyamides. Its characteristics include extended elastic stiffness under dynamic loads with higher tensile strength, very low polymeric creep and increased structural integrity in extreme temperatures and challenging environmental conditions.
Honeycomb Geometry
Tough Cell is structured into a 3D honeycomb formation of cells. This geocell structure mitigate vertical load the passive resistance of adjoining cells , distribute the vertical load on a larger area reducing the strain on one spot and maximizes the load bearing capacity of soil beneath.
Cell Perforations
The Tough Cell wall perforations and their friction with the soil provide anchoring soil interlock and drainage as well as allowing root proliferation ensure even greater rooted soil mass reinforcement. The same perforations optimize water drainage by limiting the hydrostatic buildup.
Research
The Tough Cell Geocells in road construction applications has been widely tested and researched over the past 10 years. World renowned geotechnical experts have collaborated and published over 55 professional papers regarding Tough Cell technology and the Neoloy nano-polymeric alloy. Leading institutes took part in this extensive testing and certification process, amongst them are: US Federal and State Departments of Transportation (DOT), US Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), KOAC-NPC Road Standards Institute- Holland and many more transportation and geoengineering authorities around the world.
Recent Projects
Tough Cell has been successfully used in many projects in industries and applications such as municipal and government, oil and gas, mining, landscaping, railways and airports, emergency and military and many more.
Village of Ryley, Canada
The Village of Ryley's main road needed a major rebuild with a limited budget. By using Tough Cell for the project, a durable road was successfully build with 25% reduction in excavation and asphalt use, 20% less CO2 released into the air and more than 50% maintenance costs reductions expected over the life of the road.
MEG Energy, Canada
MEG Energy urgently needed to build a road before winter, including the passage over a very deep swamp. Tough Cell allowed for the construction of a durable access road in only 40 days, by using locally available sand.
Tough Cell Gallery
Building Access Roads with Tough Cell Over Swamps
