Non-Contact Experiment Investigation of the Interaction between the Soil and Underground Granary Subjected to Water Buoyancy

The buoyancy of underwater can cause the underground granary to overall float, or even overturn, and the interaction between the soil and underground granary is the key to its stability. This paper introduces a non-contact experiment system utilizing the digital image correlation (DIC) technology and particle image velocity (PIV) technology, and its measurement accuracy is analyzed. Then, this system is employed to study the granary displacement and the soil deformation around the granary subjected to the buoyancy of water. Results show that with the increase of the degree of compaction of the soil around the granary, the floating water level increases by 10.77% and the vertical displacement decreases by 17%. When the soils around the granary are loose sands, the soil deformation range shows an obvious inverted triangle. When the soils are medium dense sands, the soil deformation zone concentrates at the junction of the conical granary bottom and granary wall. When the soils are dense sands, the disturbed range of the soil obviously reduces, and the soil deformation concentrates on both sides of the granary wall and is distributed symmetrically. Finally, taking the medium dense sands around the granary as an example, the reasons for the unstable failure of the granary subjected to buoyancy are discussed, assisted by the soil pressure theory of retaining wall. With the granary increasingly inclining, the soil deviating from the inclined direction of the granary loses its support, which drives the soils to reach the active limit state. The soil in the inclined direction of the granary is squeezed, resulting in passive soil pressure on the granary wall. The soil deformation increases continuously to a passive limit equilibrium state, and the soil continuously develops a sliding surface, resulting in the unstable failure of the granary. This research is expected to provide the technical guidance for the design and popularization of underground granaries.

Investigation of Unstable Failure Potential of a Shear Slip Using DEM at an Underground Mine

Geological structures and discontinuities subjected to the perturbations posed by mining operations in underground mining can be re-activated and cause fault-slip rockbursts. This study investigates geomechanical stability in terms of shear slip behavior along discontinuities using 3DEC with focusing on sudden changes of shear stress and shear displacement. A direct shear test is performed using a continuously yielding joint model to examine the evolution of shear stress and shear displacement on this joint. Further, this continuously yielding joint model is applied in major discontinuities of an underground mine to examine whether an unstable shear slip behavior exists, which is represented by a significant shear stress decrease and a shear displacement increase. By referring to geological mapping of this mine, four cases are developed and each case is set up with one type of major discontinuities with identically simulated mining operations. Results imply that the amplitude of shear stress decrease and shear displacement increase along discontinuities substantially increases with the depth due to higher virgin stresses and mining-induced stresses at greater depths. The discontinuity parallel to the interface between footwall and orebody is the least safe case and subjects to the largest potential of triggering seismic events. Keywords: Shear slip behavior, Unstable failure, Mining-induced seismicity, Continuously yielding joint model, DEM.

Acoustic emission characteristics of pre-cracked specimens under biaxial compression

This paper presents an experimental study in which molded gypsum pre-cracked specimens with two types of flaw (single and X-shaped cross flaws) were tested under biaxial compression. Results show that acoustic emission (AE) energy rate curves can be divided into three different periods during uniaxial compression, which correspond to crack closure, linear elastic and unstable failure stages of specimens. However, only two periods are observed during biaxial compression, which correspond to linear elastic deformation and unstable failure. Furthermore, two proposed AE parameters, namely the AE energy ratio and AE energy release ratio, and a classical AE parameter b-value were used to analyze the influence of biaxial compression loading on AE energy, respectively. With increasing confining pressure, the AE energy release ratio, as well as AE b-value decreases gradually while AE energy ratio increases. Moreover, maximum and average AE energy rate values decrease as confining pressure increases. Data presented herein is useful to study the AE characteristics of pre-cracked specimens under biaxial compression.

Static and Dynamic Influence of the Shear Zone on Rockburst Occurrence in the Headrace Tunnel of the Neelum Jhelum Hydropower Project, Pakistan

Rockburst is an unstable failure of a rock mass which is influenced by many factors. During deep excavations, the presence of nearby geological structures such as minor faults, joints, and shear zones increases the likelihood of rockburst occurrence. A shear zone has been observed in the headrace tunnel in the Neelum Jhelum Hydropower Project, Pakistan, which has played an important role in major rockburst events in the project’s history. A rockburst is a seismic event that involves the release of a great amount of energy as the dynamic wave radiated from the seismic source reaches the excavation boundary. In this paper, the FLAC 2D explicit numerical code has been used to simulate the dynamic phenomenon of rockburst near the shear zone in a headrace tunnel. The behavior of the rock mass around the tunnel has been studied under both static and dynamic loading. According to modeling results, rockburst significantly affected the upper left quadrant of the tunnel similar to the actual failure profile with a depth of approximately 5 m. The dynamic impact of rockburst has also affected the loading conditions of the support system in the adjacent tunnel. This study elucidates one of the most important rockburst controlling factors through numerical analysis and recommends yielding support measures that can withstand the dynamic impacts of rockburst in deep, hard rock tunnels.

Proposal of Simplified J-Integral Evaluation Method for a Through Wall Crack in SFR Pipe Made of Mod.9Cr-1Mo Steel

A simplified J-integral evaluation method applicable to unstable failure analysis in Leak Before Break (LBB) assessment of Sodium-cooled Fast Reactor (SFR) in Japan was proposed. Mod.9Cr-1Mo steel is supposed to be a candidate material for the coolant systems of SFR in Japan. This steel has relatively high yield strength and poor fracture toughness comparing to those of conventional austenitic stainless steels. In addition, SFR pipe has small thickness and large diameter. Furthermore, in SFR, primary stresses are insignificant and displacement controlled secondary stresses are predominant. Therefore, the load balance in such piping system changes by crack extension and R6 (2-parameter) method (hereinafter “2-parameter method”) [1] using J-integral is applicable to unstable failure analysis for the pipes under such loading conditions. As a J-integral evaluation method for circumferential through-wall crack in a cylinder, EPRI has proposed a fully plastic solution method. However, the geometry of SFR pipe and material characteristics of Mod.9Cr-1Mo steel exceed the applicable range of EPRI’s method. Therefore, a series of elastic, elasto-plastic and plastic finite element analyses (FEA) were performed for a pipe with a circumferential through-wall crack to propose a J-integral evaluation method applicable to such loading conditions. J-integrals obtained from the FEA were resolved into elastic, local plastic and fully plastic components. Each component was expressed as a function of analytical parameter, such as pipe geometries, crack size, material characteristics and so on. As a result, a simplified J-integral evaluation method was proposed. The method enables to conduct 2-parameter method using J-integral without any fracture mechanics knowledge.

Engineering Application of the Slope Failure Criterion

The nouniformity of rock and soil materials and differences of boundary conditions caused the differentiation of stress field, together with the elastic-plastic characteristics of sliding zone material control the progressive unstable failure process. In this paper, The analysis of engineering example shows that the mechanical criterion is reasonable to judge the state of progressive slope evolution.