EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION ON MULTI-FRACTAL CHARACTERISTICS OF ACOUSTIC EMISSION OF COAL SAMPLES SUBJECTED TO TRUE TRIAXIAL LOADING–UNLOADING

Coal–rock dynamic disasters seriously threaten safe production in coal mines, and an effective early warning is especially important to reduce the losses caused by these disasters. The occurrence of coal–rock dynamic disasters is determined by mining-induced stress loading and unloading. Therefore, it is of great significance to analyze the precursory information of coal deformation and failure during true triaxial stress loading and unloading. In this study, the deformation and failure of coal samples subjected to true triaxial loading and unloading, including fixed axial stress and unloading confining stress (FASUCS), are experimentally investigated. Meanwhile, acoustic emission (AE) during the deformation of coal samples is monitored, and the multi-fractal characteristics of AE are analyzed. Furthermore, combined with the deformation and failure of coal samples, the precursory information of coal deformation and rupture during true triaxial stress loading and unloading is obtained. Finally, the relationship between multi-fractal characteristics and damage evolution of coal samples under FASUCS is discussed. The results show that the multi-fractal spectral widths of AE time series under the conditions of FASUCS with different initial confining stresses or unloading rates are quite different, but the dynamic changes of multi-fractal parameters [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] are similar. This indicates that the microscopic complexity of AE events of coal samples under different conditions of FASUCS differs, but the macroscopic generation mechanism of AE events has inherent uniformity. The dynamic changes of [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] can reflect the stress and damage degree of coal samples. The dynamic change process of [Formula: see text] well accords with the damage evolution process of coal samples. A gradual decrease of [Formula: see text] corresponds to a slow increase of damage, while a sharp increase of it corresponds to a rapid growth of damage. At the same time, the mutation point of damage curve at distinct stress difference levels shares the same variation trend with the [Formula: see text] mutation point. The change of [Formula: see text] can reflect the damage process of coal samples, which can be used as precursor information for predicting coal–rock rupture. The finding is of great significance for the early warning of coal–rock dynamic disasters.