106 Intact rock

behaviour at a strain rate in the laboratory of 1x and very much more

ductile behaviour when undergoing tectonic movements at strain rates of
1x Note that this range is through 21 orders of magnitude.

Temperature effects. Only a limited amount of information is available

indicating the effect of temperature on the complete stress-strain curve
and other mechanical properties of intact rock. The limited test data do
however agree with one’s intuition, that an increase in temperature
reduces the elastic modulus and compressive strength, whilst increasing
the ductility in the post-peak region. The complete stress-strain curves
shown in Fig. 6.17 illustrate this trend. Also, very high temperatures can
result in damage to the microstructure. At the other end of the
temperature spectrum, there is increasing interest in the effect of very
low temperatures on rock, within the context of liquified natural gas
storage.

Strain in percent

Figure 6.17 The effect of temperature on the complete stress-strain curve.

6.5 Failure criteria

We do not know exactly how a rock fails, either in terms of the precise
details of each microcrack initiation and propagation, or in terms of the total
structural breakdown as many microcracks propagate and coalesce. In both
cases, the process is extremely complex and not subject to convenient
characterization through simplified models. Nevertheless, as engineers we
should like some measure of the failure properties and the ability to predict
when failure will occur. It was mentioned earlier that stress has been
 Failure criteria 107

traditionally regarded as the ‘cause’ and strain as the ’effect’ in materials

testing: as a consequence, early testing and standards utilized a constant
stress rate application. It was then natural to express the strength of a
material in terms of the stress present in the test specimen at failure. Since
uniaxial and triaxial testing of rock are by far the most common laboratory
procedures in rock mechanics and rock enpeering, the most obvious
means of expressing a failure criterion is

strength = f(q,02,q).

With the advent of stiff and servo-controlled testing machines and the
associated preference for strain rate control, perhaps the strength could be
expressed in the form

strength = f(q,E ~ E, ~ ) .

We also discussed the possibility of more eclectic forms of control such

as constant rate of energy input, leading to more sophisticated possibilities
for strength criteria expressed in the form

Despite this possibility, the number and variation of the failure criteria
which have been developed, and which are in some degree of everyday
use, are rather limited. The Mohr-Coulomb criterion expresses the relation
between the shear stress and the normal stress at failure. The plane Griffith
criterion expresses the uniaxial tensile strength in terms of the strain energy
required to propagate microcracks, and expresses the uniaxial compressive
strength in terms of the tensile strength. The Hoek-Brown criterion is
an empirical criterion derived from a ’best-fit’ to strength data plotted in
01-03 space.
We will be presenting outlines of these criteria below; for a full derivation
and more complete explanation and discussion, the reader is referred to
the text by Jaeger and Cook (1979)for the Mohr-Coulomb and the Griffith
criteria, and to Hoek and Brown (1980), Hoek (1990)and Hoek et al. (1992)
for the Hoek-Brown criterion.

6.5.7 The Mohr-Coulomb Criterion

The plane along which failure occurs and the Mohr envelope are shown
in Fig. 6.18 for the two-dimensional case, together with some of the key
expressions associated with the criterion. From the initial principal
stresses, the normal stress and shear stress on a plane at any angle can be
found using the transformation equations, as represented by Mohr’s circle.
Utilizing the concept of cohesion (i.e. the shear strength of the rock when
no normal stress is applied) and the angle of internal friction (equivalent
to the angle of inclination of a surface sufficient to cause sliding of a
superincumbent block of similar material down the surface), we generate
108 Intact rock
BASIC EQUATIONS Rock fails at a critical combination of normal and shear stresses:

IT1 = To + pun

z0 = cohesion I*. = coeff. of friction

171=+(u, - u3)sin 2p

U" =i(LT,+ +i(u,-a3)cos 2p

UJ

The equation for 171 and onare the equations of a circle in FUNDAMENTAL GEOMETRY
(u,T) space:

T
cutoff, To e Mohr
n envelope; m

At failure,
2p = 90 + $ I
' 1
2P j p = 45 + f

ut Dl
Uniaxial Un2xial
tension compression

Figure 6.18 The Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion.

the linear Mohr envelope, which defines the limiting size for the Mohr's
circles. In other words, (FZ co-ordinates below the envelope represent
stable conditions; CFZ co-ordinates on the envelope represent limiting
equilibrium; and o-zco-ordinates above the envelope represent conditions
unobtainable under static loading. Because the criterion is developed for
compressive stresses, a tensile cut-off is usually utilized to give a realistic
value for the uniaxial tensile strength.
We anticipate that this criterion is most suitable at high confining
pressures when the material does, in fact, fail through development of
shear planes. At lower confining pressures, and in the uniaxial case, we
have seen that failure occurs by gradual increase in the density of
microcracks sub-parallel to the major principal stress, and hence we would
not expect this type of frictional criterion to apply directly. However, at the
higher confining pressures, the criterion can be useful and it should be
noted, with reference to Fig. 6.18, that the failure plane will be orientated
at p = 45" + (qY2).
The influence of a significant water pressure in porous materials (which
is deducted from the normal stress components, but not from the shear
stress component) is clear as the Mohr's circle is moved to the left by an
amount equal to the water pressure, hence introducing the possibility of
the Mohr's circle moving from a stable region to be in contact with the
Mohr envelope.
Despite the difficulties associated with application of the criterion,
it does remain in use as a rapidly calculable method for engineering
practice, and is especially significant and valid for discontinuities and
discontinuous rock masses.