Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

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Computers and Geotechnics

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Shear behaviors of natural rock fractures infilled with cemented calcite

Zhihong Zhao a, Tao Lin a, Yuedu Chen a, Xingguang Zhao b, *, Liang Chen b, Ju Wang b
a
Department of Civil Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
b
CAEA Innovation Center on Geological Disposal of High Level Radioactive Waste, Beijing Research Institute of Uranium Geology, Beijing, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keyword: Shear behaviors of naturally infilled granite fractures were investigated using experimental and numerical ap­
Direct shear test proaches in this study. The tested granite fracture samples were collected from two boreholes BS48 and BS49 at
Infilled fractures the Xinchang site in the Beishan area of Gansu Province, China. Particle-based DEM models for the naturally
Particle-based discrete element method
infilled granite fractures were built up and calibrated with the experimental results. Effects of normal stress and
t/a ratio
infilling ratio (t/a) on shear behaviors and properties of infilled fractures were investigated. The results show that
the shear stress-shear displacement curves of the naturally infilled fractures include three shear phases, i.e.,
quasi-elastic phase, failure phase, and residual shear phase. The relationships between normal stresses and peak
shear strength, residual shear strength, shear stiffness and peak dilation are fitted using an approximately linear
function. Infilling ratio (t/a) has a significant influence on the shear properties of the naturally infilled fractures.
Shear strength and stiffness of the naturally infilled fractures decrease with increasing (t/a). The different shear
behaviors of the various infilled and clean fractures are also briefly compared. Practical implications and
outstanding issues in the present study are discussed finally.

1. Introduction cohesive clay, grout, or frictional sand (Papaliangas et al. 1993; Pereira
1997; Indraratna et al. 1999, 2005, 2014; Indraratna and Jayanathan,
Multi-scale discontinuities in the forms of faults, joints, fractures, 2005; Mirzaghorbanali et al. 2014; Jahanian and Sadaghiani 2015;
veins and bedding planes have a controlling influence on the mechanical Cheng et al. 2016; Lu et al. 2017; Meng et al. 2017; Wan et al. 2018;
behaviors of rock masses, because they commonly act as planes of Saadat and Taheri 2019; Zhao et al. 2020). Infilled fractures usually
weakness on which further displacement can more readily occur (Luo have a lower shear strength than clean fractures, because the infilling
et al. 2016; Zhao et al. 2018, 2020). Rock fractures are often infilled with materials separate the fracture walls to avoid direct contacts between
natural materials such as rock fragments, clay particles or artificial asperities. The infilling ratio (t/a), which is defined as the ratio of the
materials like grout (Zhao and Zhou 2016; Lu et al. 2017; Zhou et al. average thickness (t) of the infilling materials to the average asperity
2020). To date, numerous experimental, theoretical or numerical studies amplitude (a) of the fracture surfaces (Fig. 1), has been proposed to
on the shear behaviors of clean (or called unfilled) rock fractures have characterize the effect of infilling materials on shear properties of
been conducted, and a number of shear strength models of clean rock infilled fractures (Ladanyi and Archambault, 1977). The average
fractures have been proposed and widely used in practice, e.g., the JRC- asperity amplitude of the fracture surface and the average thickness of
JCS (Joint Roughness Coefficient-Joint Compressive Strength) empirical the infilling materials are determined as:
model (Barton and Choubey 1977). Compared with the wide knowledge ∫
1 L
on clean rock fractures, the present understanding of shear behaviors of a= [z1 (x) + z2 (x) ]dx (1a)
infilled fractures still remains poor due to the technical difficulties in L 0
sample preparation and boundary condition control. ∫ L
1
Table 1 lists the representative experimental studies on shear be­ t= [d − z1 (x) − z2 (x) ]dx (1b)
L
haviors of infilled fractures. Most of the existing studies on shear be­ 0

haviors of infilled fractures focused on artificial fracture samples with

where z1 (x) and z2 (x) are the lower and upper surface functions,
regular fracture surfaces, and the tested infilling materials were mainly
respectively; d is the distance between the two reference planes; L is the

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: xingguang100@126.com (X. Zhao).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compgeo.2021.104493
Received 28 July 2021; Received in revised form 23 September 2021; Accepted 30 September 2021
Available online 27 October 2021
0266-352X/© 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

Table 1
Experimental studies on shear behaviors of infilled fractures.
References Fracture materials Surface Infilling materials Sample size
roughness

Papaliangas et al. (1993) Multicomponent plaster Rough Pulverised fuel ash 250 mm × 120 mm
Pereira (1997) Sandstone Planar Sand Diameter 100 and 152 mm
Height 74–88 mm
Indraratna et al. (1999) Gypsum plaster (CaSO4 Sawtooth Bentonite –
hemihydrate)
Indraratna and Jayanathan (2005) Gypsum plaster Sawtooth Natural gouge material (silty clay) Diameter 54 mm, Height 108 mm
Indraratna et al. (2008)
Indraratna et al. (2010a) Gypsum plaster (CaSO4 Sawtooth Clayey sand (75% fine sand and 25% 250 mm × 75 mm × 150 mm (upper)
Mirzaghorbanali et al. (2014) hemihydrate) kaolinite) or 100 mm (lower)
Indraratna et al. (2010b) Sandstone Rough Commercial clay (kaolinite) –
Indraratna et al. (2013, 2014) Gypsum plaster (CaSO4 Sawtooth Silty clay (25% fine sand and 75% Diameter 54 mm
hemihydrate) kaolinite) Height 108 mm
Lu et al. (2017) Sandstone Sawtooth Cement 100 mm × 100 mm × 100 mm
Gong et al. (2018) Gypsum plaster (CaSO4 Rough Mixture of fine sand (25%) and 250 mm × 75 mm × 150 mm (upper)
hemihydrate) commercial kaolin (75%) or 100 mm (lower)
Shrivastava and Rao (2018) Plaster of Paris Sawtooth Combination of fine sand and mica 297 mm × 297 mm × 125 mm
dust
She and Sun (2018) Granite Rough Cement 100 mm × 100 mm × 200 mm
Zhao et al. (2020) Mixture of Portland cement, Rough Sand or clay 100 mm × 65 mm × 65 mm
sand and water

cohesive (Duriez et al. 2011; Saadat and Taheri 2019; Tang et al.
2020) or cohesive materials (Karakus et al. 2016).

2. Shear behavior of natural fractures infilled with cemented

calcite

2.1. Experimental procedure

The tested granite fracture samples were collected from boreholes

Fig. 1. Schematic of infilled rock fractures and the parameters used to deter­
mine infilling ratio (t/a) (Eq. (1)).
fracture length (Fig. 1).
In general, shear strengths of infilled fractures decrease with
increasing t/a, and may approach the intrinsic strength of infilling ma­
terials when t/a is beyond a certain value (Lu et al. 2017; Zhao et al.
2020). By modifying the existing peak shear strength models of clean
fractures, a few peak shear strength models of infilled fractures have
been proposed (Papaliangas et al. 1993; Indraratna et al. 2008; Ma and
Liu 2017; Tian et al. 2018). Although the effects of t/a, mechanical
properties of infilling materials, surface roughness, and normal stress on
fracture shear strength are considered in the existing shear strength
models of infilled fractures, they are usually derived based on idealized
fracture surface geometries and empirical relationships between friction
angle of infilled fractures and t/a, or validated using the data obtained
from one specific case study (Tian et al. 2018; Zhao et al. 2020). It is
difficult to generalize the shear strength models of infilled fractures for
practical rock engineering because of the limited understanding of the
shear mechanisms of the naturally infilled fractures (Saadat and Taheri
2019).
The main aim of this study is to reveal the shear behaviors of natu­
rally infilled fractures prepared from the drill core in Beishan, Gansu
Province, China. In addition to direct shear tests performed on granite
fracture samples, particle-based DEM (Discrete Element Method) is
employed to build up the numerical granite fracture samples and to
simulate the shear behaviors of infilled fractures from the point of view
of microcrack development. Particle-based DEM has been used to suc­
cessfully simulate the shear process of clean fractures (Park and Song
2009; Asadi et al., 2012; Zhao et al. 2012, 2019; Bahaaddini et al., 2013,
2015, 2016; Lambert and Coll 2014) and infilled fractures with non-
BS48 (depth of about 80.9–598.8 m) and BS49 (depth of about
434.5–525.0 m), at the Xinchang site in the Beishan area of Gansu
Province, China, which contains many granite intrusions and has been
recommended as the priority area for the high-level radioactive waste
repository (Fig. 2a). Ten natural granite fracture samples infilled with
calcite were prepared from the drill core by wire cutting. The sizes of the
natural granite fracture samples are about 60 mm in length, 60 mm in
width and 40 mm in thickness (Fig. 2b). Following the ISRM suggested
method for laboratory determination of the shear strength of rock
fractures (Muralha et al. 2014), we performed direct shear tests using
YZW-50 apparatus at Tsinghua University (Fig. 3; Zhao et al. 2019). The
prescribed normal force was first applied perpendicular to the fracture
surface, and then the shear loading was invoked by applying a constant
velocity of 0.4 mm/min on the horizontal piston. The constant normal
stresses of 5–20 MPa were considered in this study.
2.2. Experimental results
The curves of shear stress and normal displacement versus shear
displacement for the naturally infilled fractures are plotted in Fig. 4a.
The naturally infilled fractures exhibited a similar shear behavior under
different normal stresses, i.e., 1) a quasi-elastic phase where the shear
stress increased approximately linearly with increasing shear displace­
ment, 2) a failure phase where the shear stress nonlinearly increased to
the peak shear strength and then sharply dropped, 3) and a residual
shear phase where the shear stress became stable. With increasing
normal stresses, the post-peak stress drop became gentle. The shear-
induced dilations generally increased with increasing shear displace­
ment in the quasi-elastic phase, whereas the shear-induced dilations did
not increase significantly or even decreased in the residual phase.
Fig. 4b and Table 2 show the relationship between normal stresses
and the five characteristic shear parameters including peak shear
strength (τp), residual shear strength (τr), shear stiffness (ks), and shear
displacement (up) and dilation (ud) at peak shear stress (peak shear

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Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

(a) Locations of boreholes BS48 and 49

(b) Infilled granite fracture sample

Fig. 2. The drill cores including infilled fractures collected from boreholes BS48 and BS49 at the Xinchang site in the Beishan area, China. (a) Locations of boreholes
BS48 and 49 (b) Infilled granite fracture sample.

Fig. 3. Direct shear testing apparatus (YZW-50) and fracture sample before and after shear.

displacement and peak dilation are called for short hereafter). Cou­
lomb’s linear relation (Eq. (2)) was used to fit the normal stress-
dependent peak and residual shear strengths.
τp = cp + σ n tanφp
τr = cr + σ n tanφr
where c and φ are cohesion and friction angle, the subscripts ‘p’ and ‘r’
represent the cohesions and friction angles corresponding to peak and
residual shear strengths, respectively. Eq. (2) fitted the relationship
between normal stresses and peak and residual shear strengths with R2
> 0.85 (Fig. 4b), and best-fit values of c and φ are also given in Fig. 4b.
Note that the residual friction angle is higher than the peak friction
angle.
(2a)
In addition to the peak and residual shear strengths, the relationships
between normal stresses and shear stiffness, peak shear displacement
(2b)
and peak dilation were fitted by a linear function (Eq. (3)).
y = y0 + mσ n (3)
where y represents the characteristic shear parameters, y0 is the initial

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Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

25 0.5 25 0.5
J1 J2 J3 J4

20 0.4 20 0.4

Normal displacement (mm)

Normal displacement (mm)

Shear stress (MPa)

Shear stress (MPa)

15 0.3 15 0.3

10 0.2 10 0.2

5 0.1 5 0.1

0 0.0 0 0.0
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0
Shear displacement (mm) Shear displacement (mm)

(a) 5 MPa (b) 8 MPa

25 0.5 25 0.5

J5 J6 J7 J8

20 0.4 20 0.4

Normal displacement (mm)

Normal displacement (mm)

Shear stress (MPa)

Shear stress (MPa)

15 0.3 15 0.3

10 0.2 10 0.2

5 0.1 5 0.1

0 0.0 0 0.0
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0
Shear displacement (mm) Shear displacement (mm)

(c) 12 MPa (d) 16 MPa

25 0.5
J9 J10

20 0.4
Normal displacement (mm)
Shear stress (MPa)

15 0.3

10 0.2

5 0.1

0 0.0
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0
Shear displacement (mm)

(e) 20 MPa

(a) Shear stress--shear displacement (solid lines) and normal displacement-shear

displacement (dashed lines) curves
Fig. 4. Shear behaviors of natural granite fractures infilled with cemented calcite. (a) Shear stress–shear displacement (solid lines) and normal displacement-shear
displacement (dashed lines) curves (b) Relationship between shear parameters and normal stress.

values of the characteristic shear parameters when σn = 5 MPa, m is a 3. Particle-based DEM model
fitting parameter. Eq. (3) fitted the relationships between normal
stresses and shear stiffness and peak dilation with R2 > 0.58 (Fig. 4b). In 3.1. Model setup and calibration
contrast, the low R2 indicates that the relationship between normal
stresses and peak shear displacement might not follow a linear function. Two-dimensional (2D) particle flow code (PFC2D) was used to model
The obtained fitting functions and parameters can be used to estimate naturally infilled granite fractures (Potyondy and Cundall 2004). The
the shear parameters of infilled fractures in different depths to a first intact granite and the infilling material are represented as a 2D dense
approximation. packing assembly of circular disks with non-uniform sizes. Parallel
bonds, which provide a general way to represent cements between

4
Z. Zhao et al.
Fig. 4. (continued).
grains, are installed at contacts between the disks. To accurately reflect
the mechanical behavior of naturally infilled granite fractures, three
kinds of parallel bonds with different mechanical properties are
considered to represent intact granite, infilling materials, and granite-
infilling interfaces, respectively. When the corresponding component
of the contact force reaches either tensile or shear strength of the parallel
bond, damage occurs and microcrack forms.
The numerical infilled fracture samples contained about 10,000
circular disks with radius uniformly distributed between 0.129 mm and
0.213 mm. The overall size of the model was 50 mm (length) × 50 mm
(width) (Fig. 5). Because the disk sizes are much smaller than the min­
eral grain sizes (i.e., 1–3 mm) of Beishan granite, both intragranular and
intergranular microcracks can be captured in the present model. Ac­
cording to the mineral composition of Beishan granite, the disks
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Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493
representing intact granite were randomly specified with different
mineral types. The disks representing the infilling material were within
the middle part of the model, which separated the intact granite into the
upper and lower parts. By projecting the scanned fracture upper and
lower surface profiles on the PFC2D model, the disks ranged between
upper and lower surface profiles were specified as the infilling material.
Note that the parallel bonds representing granite-infilling interface had
different strengths from those of intact granite and infilling materials.
Using the servo control algorithm in PFC2D, the constant normal stress
was applied on the numerical granite samples. A shear velocity of 0.425
m/s was applied on the upper and lower shear boxes in the opposite
directions. These boundary conditions were reasonable to ensure that
the numerical samples remained under a quasi-static equilibrium state
during shear. The microcrack development in fracture walls, normal
Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

Table 2 initiation stress and residue shear phase (Points a and c in Fig. 7). Crack
Experimental results of shear parameters of naturally infilled granite fractures. initiation stress (τci) is defined as the state that the pre-existing cracks
Sample No. σn τp τr ks up ud start to propagate and new cracks start to initiate in a stable fashion
(MPa) (MPa) (MPa) (GPa/m) (mm) (mm) (Shang et al. 2021), i.e., AE starts to appear systematically when the
J1 5 11.04 4.25 14.28 0.89 0.26 stress level is above τci. After entering the residual shear phase a shear
J2 15.39 4.30 19.50 0.87 0.38 band form and the sample slip under an approximately stable shear
J3 8 16.22 6.95 18.17 1.03 0.15 stress.
J4 12.07 7.72 14.81 0.99 0.39 Fig. 8 shows the spatial distributions of the shear-induced micro­
J5 12 17.07 10.87 21.87 0.71 0.07
J6 16.26 7.38 20.66 0.78 0.11
cracks in the numerical infilled fracture sample under different normal
J7 16 16.01 11.00 22.78 0.91 0.08 stresses. The microcracks mainly concentrated in the infilling materials
J8 15.49 9.83 19.86 0.97 0.16 and the narrow zones of granites closed to the granite-infilling in­
J9 20 16.97 13.00 22.84 0.94 0.05 terfaces. Fig. 9 shows the statistical results of microcracks in the nu­
J10 20.36 15.51 21.78 1.11 0.06
merical samples of infilled fractures after shear. With increasing normal
Note: The parameters of τp, τr, ks, up and ud represent peak shear strength, re­ stresses, the number of shear-induced microcracks in the granites
sidual shear strength, shear stiffness, shear displacement at peak shear stress and increased significantly. In contrast, the number of shear-induced
dilation at peak shear stress, respectively. microcracks in the infilling materials and infilling-granite interfaces
did not change. This is because the bonds in the infilling materials and
displacement of the fracture walls and shear stresses were monitored infilling-granite interfaces were fully broken during compression and
using the FISH in PFC2D (Potyondy and Cundall 2004). shear. With increasing normal stresses, there were more microcracks
A trial-and-error process was firstly performed to calibrate the that were generated during compression.
microscopic parameters (Table 3) of the numerical infilled fracture
samples based on the experimental results under the normal stress of 12 4. Discussion
MPa (Fig. 6a and b), and then the calibrated microscopic parameters
were used to predict the shear properties of numerical infilled fracture 4.1. Effect of t/a ratio on shear behaviors of infilled fractures
samples under other normal stresses of 5, 8, 16, and 20 MPa, respec­
tively (Fig. 6c–g). The numerically obtained shear stress-shear It has been recognized that the infilling ratio t/a is a proper
displacement and dilation-shear displacement curves were in agree­
ment with the experimental ones (Fig. 6a and b). The numerically pre­
Table 3
dicted relationships between normal stresses and the five characteristic
Microscopic parameters of the numerical specimen.
shear parameters were also in a similar trend with the experimental
results (Fig. 6c–g, Table 4). Therefore, it demonstrates that these Parameters Values
microscopic parameters successfully captured the macroscopic shear Granite Infilling Interface*
behavior of naturally infilled fractures. Note that all the numerical shear material
tests under different normal stresses were performed on the same model, Density (kg/m3) 2630 2630 –
whereas the experimental shear tests were performed on different Ball modulus (GPa) 5 4.5 –
samples. This is why there existed some differences between the Shear to normal stiffness 1/3.6 1/3.6
Parallel bond modulus (GPa) 1 0.9 0.9
numerically and experimentally obtained normal stresses dependent
Parallel bond shear to normal stiffness 1/3.6 1/3.6 1/3.6
characteristic shear parameters. Friction coefficient 0.15 0.65 –
Particle maximum radius (mm) 0.213 0.213 –
Parallel bond normal strength 80 ± 40 8±4 24 ± 12
3.2. Microcrack development in infilled fractures undergoing shear (mean ± standard deviation, MPa)
Parallel bond shear strength 80 ± 40 8±4 24 ± 12
(mean ± standard deviation, MPa)
Fig. 7 presents the development of microcracks in the numerical Radius multiplier 1.6 1.6 –
infilled fracture during shear under the normal stress of 12 MPa. The
Note: The symbol * represent the parallel bonds between disks mimicking
curve of microcrack number-shear displacement was in an approximate
granites and infilling materials.
‘S’ shape, and the two transition points were associated with crack

Fig. 5. Particle-based DEM model for the granite sample including a natural fracture infilled with cemented calcite.

6
Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

20 0.5
Experiment result Experiment result
Numerical result Numerical result
0.4

Normal displacement (mm)

15

Shear stress (MPa)

0.3

10

0.2

5
0.1

0 0.0
0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0
Shear displacement (mm) Shear displacement (mm)

(a) Shear stress-shear displacement (b) Normal displacement-shear displacement

25 25
Experiment result
Experiement result
Numerical result
Numerical result
20 20
Peak shear strength (MPa)

Residual strength (MPa)

15 15

10 10

5 5

0 0
5 10 15 20 5 10 15 20

Normal stress (MPa) Normal stress (MPa)

(c) Peak shear strength-normal stress (d) Residual shear strength-normal stress
40 1.5
Experiment result Experiment result
Numerical result Numerical result
Peak shear displacement (mm)

30
Shear stiffness (GPa/m)

1.0

20

0.5
10

0 0.0
5 10 15 20 5 10 15 20
Normal stress (MPa) Normal stress (MPa)
(e) Shear stiffness-normal stress (f) Peak shear displacement-normal stress
0.5
Experiment result
Numerical result

0.4
Normal displacement (mm)

0.3

0.2

0.1

0.0
5 10 15 20
Normal stress (MPa)

(g) Normal displacement vs. normal stress

Fig. 6. Comparison between the numerical and experimental results. (a) Shear stress-shear displacement (b) Normal displacement-shear displacement (c) Peak shear
strength-normal stress (d) Residual shear strength-normal stress (e) Shear stiffness-normal stress (f) Peak shear displacement-normal stress (g) Normal displacement
vs. normal stress.

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Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

Table 4 influence on the shear mechanical properties of the cement-grout-filled

Numerical results of shear parameters of infilled granite fracture samples. joints, and two critical ratios are observed, i.e., (t/a) = 0.1 and 1.0.
σn τp τr ks up ud When the filling ratio is below 0.1, the shear parameters of infilled
(MPa) (MPa) (MPa) (GPa/m) (mm) (mm) fractures increase rapidly with increasing infilling ratios. When the
5 10.75 4.52 23.18 0.62 0.28 filling ratio is between 0.1 and 1.0, the shear parameters decrease with
8 13.65 7.91 23.40 0.74 0.25 increasing infilling ratios. Once the filling ratio exceeds 1.0, the shear
12 16.76 8.57 23.88 0.81 0.20 parameters remain nearly unchanged. However, it is difficult to identify
16 19.13 10.66 24.03 0.88 0.20 these critical infilling ratios on the shear parameters-infilling ratio
20 21.64 12.24 24.12 1.01 0.19
curves in this study. The values of the critical infilling ratios may be
Note: The parameters of τp, τr, ks, up and ud represent peak shear strength, re­ dependent on many factors including rock types and fracture surface
sidual shear strength, shear stiffness, shear displacement at peak shear stress and roughness, and further studies needed.
dilation at peak shear stress, respectively.
4.2. Comparison between fractures infilled with cemented and
uncemented materials

Natural fractures including clean, infilled and cemented and infilled

but uncemented fractures are commonly met in practical rock engi­
neering. In this section, the shear behaviors of the three types of frac­
tures are briefly compared (Fig. 13). Among the above three types of
rock fractures, the infilled but uncemented fractures had the lowest peak
shear strength and peak dilation, and the clean fracture had the highest
peak shear strength and peak dilation. The infilled and cemented had the
most microcracks. Cementation can enhance the peak shear strength and
shear stiffness compared with the infilled but uncemented fractures.
Fig. 14 shows the distributions of contact and bond forces in the
numerical fracture samples at the peak shear strength. The contact force
chains were similar in the three types of fractures, but the bond force
chains in the clean fractures had a higher magnitude. This indicates that
the strong contacting asperities in the clean fractures bear more shear
forces, and thus the clean fracture had the highest peak shear strength.

4.3. Practical implications and limitations of this study

Fig. 7. Development of microcracks in the numerical sample during shear
under the normal stress of 12 MPa. The distributions of microcracks in the
numerical sample at points a, b and c on the shear stress-shear displacement
curve are shown in the embedded figures. The two red stars represent the
transition points associated with crack initiation stress and residue shear phase.
parameter to characterize the effect of infilling materials on shear be­
haviors of rock fractures. For natural fractures, it is extremely difficult to
control and measure the t/a ratios, but numerical method can overcome
this problem. In this study, a series of numerical infilled fractures with
different t/a ratios (0.4–2.4) were built up (Fig. 10a). Note that all the
numerical samples had the same geometries of granite-infilling
interfaces.
The curves of shear stress and normal displacement versus shear
displacement for the numerical infilled fracture samples with different t/
a ratios are plotted in Fig. 10b. The numerical samples with different t/a
ratios exhibited a similar shear behavior under different normal stresses,
but the peak shear stress phase changed from a sharp point to a short
plateau with increasing t/a ratios. The relationship between t/a ratios
and the five characteristic shear parameters are shown in Fig. 10c. Shear
stiffness decreased with increasing t/a, whereas the other shear pa­
rameters did not necessarily decrease with increasing t/a.
Fig. 11 shows the spatial distributions of the shear-induced micro­
cracks in the numerical infilled fracture samples with different infilling
ratios. With increasing infilling ratios, the number of shear-induced
microcracks in the infilling materials increased significantly, whereas
the number of shear-induced microcracks in the infilling-granite in­
terfaces and granites decreased. Fig. 12 shows the statistical results of
microcracks in the numerical samples of infilled fractures with different
t/a ratios after shear. With increasing t/a, the number of shear-induced
microcracks in the infilling materials increased significantly. In contrast,
the number of shear-induced microcracks in the granites and infilling-
granite interfaces decreased.
Lu et al. (2017) showed that the infilling ratio has a significant
The experimental and numerical results shed some lights on the
stability of underground caverns in fractured rock masses. Although the
three types of natural fractures including clean, the infilled and
cemented fractures exhibit the similar shear behaviors, the peak shear
strengths of infilled and cemented fractures are lower than clean frac­
tures and higher than the infilled but uncemented fractures. Therefore,
the shear parameters of these three types of natural fractures should be
carefully measured when assessing the stability of underground caverns
in fractured rock masses. The post-peak stress drop became gentle for the
infilled and cemented fractures with increasing normal stresses, which
means that the monitoring sensitivity should be sufficiently high for
disaster warning.
In this study the naturally infilled fracture samples were studied
using the direct shear tests under different normal stresses. Fracture
samples with identical surface roughness and t/a ratios would be ideal to
examine the effects of normal stresses on the shear behavior of infilled
fractures. It is, however, impossible to obtain the natural fracture sam­
ples with the same surface morphology or t/a ratios, even though all the
samples were prepared from the same cores. Particle-based DEM was
therefore used to overcome this problem. In addition to the model setup
method used in this study, smooth-joint model was used for the rock-
infilling interface in some other studies (Karakus et al. 2016; Tang
et al. 2020). It would be interesting to compare the numerical infilled
fracture samples generated based parallel bonds or smooth-joint models
in future.
The present study mainly focuses on the effects of normal stresses
and t/a ratios on the shear behaviors of infilled fractures, the effect of
rock-infilling interfaces is not considered. Some studies showed that
high surface roughness does not necessarily increase fracture shear
strength (Wan et al. 2018; Tang et al. 2020). If the joint surface is
smooth, the test result is primarily controlled by the cohesion of the
rock-cement interface. If the joint surface is rough, the test result is
primarily controlled by the cohesion of the rock-cement interface and

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Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

(a) Normal stress of 5 MPa (b) Normal stress of 8 MPa

(c) Normal stress of 12 MPa (d) Normal stress of 16 MPa

(e) Normal stress of 20 MPa

Fig. 8. Failure patterns of numerical samples after shear under different normal stresses. Black and red lines indicate the tensile and shear microcracks, respectively.
(For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

400
Zone
350 Infilling material
Infilling-granite interface
300 Granite
Number of cracks

250

200

150

100

50

0
5 8 12 16 20
Normal stress (MPa)

Fig. 9. Statistical results of microcracks in the numerical sample of infilled fractures. The parts infilled with inclined lines represent the numbers of microcracks
produced during normal compression before shear, and other empty parts represent numbers of microcracks produced during shear.

the fracture surface roughness (Tian et al. 2018). Therefore, the effect of infilled fractures is another important issue which should be further
rock-infilling interfaces on the shear behaviors of infilled fractures investigated.
should be considered in future studies. In addition, Ma and Liu (2017)
showed that a rock mass cannot necessarily be strengthened by all types 5. Conclusion
of cement grout, and mechanical properties of infilling materials should
be also investigated in future studies. Scale effect on shear behavior of A group of 10 naturally infilled fracture samples of Beishan granite

9
Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

Fig. 10. Effect of t/a ratios on shear behavior of granite fractures infilled by cemented calcite. Note that the shear parameters in (c) is normalized with the values of
the case of t/a = 0.4. (a) Numerical samples with different t/a ratios (b) Shear behaviors (c) Relationship between the normalized shear parameters and t/a ratios.

10
Z. Zhao et al. Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493

Fig. 11. Effect of t/a ratios on failure pattern of numerical samples of granite fractures infilled with cemented calcite.

Fig. 12. Statistical results of microcracks in numerical samples of infilled fractures with different t/a ratios after shear. The parts infilled with inclined lines represent
the numbers of microcracks produced during normal compression before shear, and other empty parts represent numbers of microcracks produced during shear.

11
Z. Zhao et al.
Fig. 13. Comparison between shear behaviors of infilled and clean granite fractures. The t/a ratio is 0.4 for those infilled fractures. (a) Shear stress-shear
displacement curves (solid lines) and development of microcracks (dashed lines) during shear (b) Normal displacement-shear displacement curve.
were sheared under different normal stresses to investigate the effect of
normal stresses on shear behaviors and properties of infilled fractures.
Particle-based DEM model was used to investigate the characteristics of
shear-induced microcracks in infilled granite samples, as well as the
effect of infilling ratios on shear behaviors and properties of infilled
fractures. The main concluding remarks are as follows:
(1) The shear stress-shear displacement curves of infilled fracture
include three shear phases in terms of quasi-elastic phase, failure
phase, and residual shear phase. The relationships between
normal stresses and peak shear strength, residual shear strength,
shear stiffness and peak dilation follow an approximate linear
function.
(2) Particle-based DEM model can successfully capture the macro­
scopic shear behavior of naturally infilled granite fractures. The
bonds in infillings and granite-infilling interfaces are already
broken during compression, and the shear-induced microcracks
12
Computers and Geotechnics 141 (2022) 104493
mainly concentrate in the narrow zones of granites closed to the
granite-infilling interfaces.
(3) Both the peak shear strength and shear stiffness decrease with
increasing t/a ratios, whereas the other three shear parameters
are not obviously affected by the infilling ratios. The failure
modes of infilled fractures change from rock-infilling interface
damage into infilling damage with increasing infilling ratios.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Zhihong Zhao: Supervision, Conceptualization, Writing - original
draft. Tao Lin: Methodology, Investigation, Writing - original draft.
Yuedu Chen: Methodology, Investigation, Writing - review & editing.
Xingguang Zhao: Supervision, Conceptualization, Writing - review &
editing. Liang Chen: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing. Ju
Wang: Conceptualization, Writing - review & editing.
Z. Zhao et al.
Fig. 14. Distributions of contact and bond forces in the numerical fracture samples at peak shear strength. The three rows from top to bottom represent infilled
fracture with cemented material, clean fracture, and infilled fracture with uncemented material. The red and black colors represent tensile and shear forces,
respectively. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgement
This work is supported by the jointly supported by the National
Natural Science Foundation of China (U2067203, 51779123,
51739006).
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