RIS ID
135704
Abstract
Weak infilled discontinuities commonly exist in rock masses, in which the infill degree of saturation largely influences the overalljoint shear behavior and ground stability. However, so far, research on the shear of infilled joints at unsaturated conditions is rare, especiallythose performed in numerical simulation. To the authors'knowledge, no attempts have been made to investigate the shear-induced variationsin unsaturated soil parameters, which are vital for proposing the infilled-joint constitutive models. For thefirst time, a series of constant watercontent direct shear tests on the unsaturated infilled-joint soil were conducted using the numerical software Fast Lagrangian Analysis ofContinua (FLAC)/Two-Phase Flow. Intrinsic soil-water retention and permeability models were updated in the FISH subroutine to considerporosity. Results highlight the disadvantage of the built-in models in FLAC. Initial infill saturation and other factors, including physical shearrate, joint roughness, infill thickness, and normal stress, all showed effects on the joint shear strength consistent with literature reports. Shear-induced variations in the mean values of Bishop effective stress and permeability of the infill layer were emphasized
Publication Details
Gong, L., Nemcik, J. & Ren, T. (2018). Numerical Simulation of the Shear Behavior of Rock Joints Filled with Unsaturated Soil. International Journal Of Geomechanics, 18 (9), 04018112-1-04018112-16.