A three-dimensional slope stability analysis method based on finite element method stress analysis

A new three-dimensional slope stability analysis method based on stress calculation by the finite element method is proposed. This method conforms to the uniform assumption of the sliding direction of the rigid limit equilibrium method and can easily be used calculate the three-dimensional sliding direction. By using this method, both the local and global safety factors of the slip surface can be calculated according to the integral mean value theorem. Additionally, an improved ellipsoidal slip surface construction method is proposed for roughly searching for the minimum safety factor and the critical slip surface. A two-stage particle swarm optimization is used to search for the critical slip surface more accurately. Two numerical examples of fixed slip surfaces are provided to confirm the effectiveness of the proposed method and its applicability to nonspherical slip surfaces. The influence of the slip surface mesh grid size, boundary conditions, Poisson's ratio, and dilatancy angle on the calculation results is revealed. Another two numerical examples of searching for the critical slip surface are then provided, and the results of the proposed method are compared with the results of the strength reduction method to confirm the validity of the proposed method.

Automated summary

A new three-dimensional slope stability analysis method is proposed based on the finite element method for stress calculation. The method can easily calculate both local and global safety factors of the slip surface and uses an improved ellipsoidal slip surface construction method and two-stage particle swarm optimization to search for the critical slip surface more accurately. The study reveals the influence of various factors on the calculation results and validates the effectiveness of the proposed method through numerical examples and comparison with the strength reduction method.