Experimental and mathematical modeling for fracture of rock joint with regular asperities

This paper is aimed at developing a mathematical model for the deformation behavior of a rock joint that explicitly accounts for the effects of joint surface topography. The present work is focused on rock joints with triangle-shaped regular asperities. Specimens of artificial rock joint with triangle-shaped asperities were made of simulated rock material and tested in the laboratory. Experimental results are examined to identify three mechanisms that influence the deformation of a rock joint: sliding, separation of asperity contact-faces, and shear fracture of asperities. A modeling methodology is then described and the behaviors of an asperity contact-face, including separation, sliding and shear fracture are discussed. The stress-deformation relationship of a rock joint is subsequently derived and the model performance is evaluated by comparing the predicted results from the derived model and the measured results from experiments. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.