Effects of mineral-grain boundary properties on mechanical and macro/micro failure behavior of high-temperature granite based on thermo-mechanical coupling cohesive zone model

Abstract

With the rapid development of deep underground engineering (e.g., deep mining, geothermal exploitation, and high-level radioactive waste disposal), high-temperature granite in deep environments is often subjected to complex thermo-mechanical coupling effects, thus making its mechanical properties and failure mechanisms critical to engineering safety. Hence, to evaluate these aspects of high-temperature granite in uniaxial compression tests, we developed a new thermo-mechanical coupling model based on cohesive zone model in ABAQUS software. The numerical model not only solves the problem of heat transfer between cohesive elements, but also represents the grain composition of granite, and adhesion and occlusion between grains. We verified the effectiveness of the model by comparing its results with those of laboratory experiments. We used this numerical model to study the effects of mineral-grain size and boundary strength on the mechanical parameters, failure mode, and microfracture characteristics of high-temperature granite. With increasing mineral-grain size, both peak stress and peak strain first decreased, then increased, and finally decreased; the failure mode changed from tensile-shear mixed failure to shear-dominant one at temperatures of 150, 300, and 450 °C, and the proportion of intergranular cracks decreased. With an increase in the boundary strength, both peak stress and peak strain increased; the main failure cracks of granite became concentrated in the local range; and the proportion of intergranular cracks decreased constantly.

Keywords

Rock mechanics / High-temperature granite / Cohesive zone model / Mineral-grain property / Microcracks

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