A case analysis for the improvement of soil properties under historical buildings and grouting applications: aksaray eskil ulu mosque example

In terms of cultural heritage, historical buildings are of great importance for our country. Historical buildings located in developing and changing cities may face settlement and bearing capacity problems due to external influences, various additional construction activities, earthquake effects, etc. over time. For the solution of these problems, solutions that require the least intervention to the historical texture should be selected. Any intervention to be made to historic buildings should be reversible, transformable, suitable for the original texture but separable from it, and radical changes should be avoided. The foundations of historic buildings, like the other parts of the building, bear the traces of the period with the material used in construction and the construction technique. Therefore, its authenticity should be preserved except when the building is faced with a static hazard. When the building encounters bearing capacity problems, the foundations should be repaired in order to maintain the existence of the historical building. In cases where the soil capacity is not sufficient, it becomes necessary to change the dimensions of the foundations under the building, to reinforce the foundations or to improve the underlying soil properties. Changing the foundation dimensions in historical buildings imposes restrictions on interventions due to the fact that the building is a cultural asset. For this reason, applications with ground improvement methods in order to increase the bearing capacity of the soil are very frequently preferred methods because they are both easy and require less intervention to the structure. In this study, the studies carried out in the ground environment in order to prevent settlements under the foundation of the building and cracks in the walls in Aksaray Eskil Ulu Mosque, which is within the Konya Regional Directorate of Foundations, were examined. The projects and applications of the ground improvement applications made in the past years under the building were analyzed and the current situation was encountered. The soil injection was discussed, and the planning and evaluation of the necessary geophysical and seismic studies after the application were detailed. After the improvement works applied on the ground, the core samples were examined, the necessary geophysical properties were determined and it was revealed that the improvement was achieved. After the completion of the soil related analyses, the necessary modeling and analyses were carried out for the upper part of the historical building using SAP 2000 program. Necessary recommendations were made for strengthening and reinforcement of the superstructure.