Rock Mech Rock Eng (2017) 50:529–541

DOI 10.1007/s00603-016-1134-6

ORIGINAL PAPER

Strength Behavior, Creep Failure and Permeability Change

of a Tight Marble Under Triaxial Compression
Zaobao Liu1 • Jianfu Shao1,2

Received: 22 March 2016 / Accepted: 14 November 2016 / Published online: 21 November 2016
 Springer-Verlag Wien 2016

Abstract The coupled hydro-mechanical behaviors of a behaviors of the marble. No time-dependent strains are
tight marble are investigated by a series of laboratory tests observed when deviatoric creep stress is lower than 50% of
with continuous gas injection during the hydrostatic com- its peak strength under Pc = 30 MPa.
pression, triaxial compression and compressive creep tests.
Hydrostatic compression tests are firstly carried out in three Keywords Hydro-mechanical behavior  Permeability 
steps to identify the viscous effect of hydrostatic stress on Stress damage  Brittle creep  Brittle failure  Jinping
deformation and permeability of the marble. Coupled tri- marble
axial tests are then conducted at a constant axial strain rate
under five different confining pressures (Pc) with continu- List of symbols
ous gas injection. Coupled creep behaviors of the marble e1 Axial strain
are also characterized by a constant deviatoric stress test e3 Radius strain
under Pc = 30 MPa with gas flowing at a constant injec- e_1 Axial strain rate
tion pressure. The high-stress unloading failure behavior of e_3 Radius strain rate
the marble is finally investigated by an unloading test with a Biot’s coefficient
a previous multi-step creep phase to realize a high-stress s Shear stress
state as well as to investigate the time-dependent defor- r Normal stress
mation of marble under different deviatoric stresses. u Material friction angle
Experimental results reveal that gas permeability of the t Dynamic Poisson
marble shows an evident rate-dependent effect in hydro- c Material cohesion coefficient
static compression. Mechanical behaviors of the tight E Unloading–reloading moduli
marble are closely depended on the applied Pc in triaxial vP Ultrasonic P-wave velocity
tests, and its permeability exhibits a decrease phase at vS Ultrasonic S-wave velocity
initial deviatoric loading and turns to increase at a critical q Differential (deviatoric) stress
stress corresponding to the initial yield stress. Marble can P c , r3 Confining pressure, hydrostatic stress
withstand more important plastic deformation under high Pi Pore pressure
Pc than under lower ones. Gas flow seems to be more kg Gas permeability
sensitive than the strains to characterize the creep k Instinct permeability of porous media
b Klinkenberg’s factor
Q Outlet volumetric flow
& Zaobao Liu L,A Sample length and cross-sectional area
zaobao.liu@polytech-lille.fr; zaobaoliu@gmail.com
P0 , DPi Outlet pressure, differential pressure and
1
Laboratory of Mechanics of Lille, University of Lille, and P mean pressure
59650 Villeneuve d’Ascq, France Re Reynolds number
2
College of Civil Engineering and Transportation, University D Hydraulic diffusivity
of Hohai, Nanjing 210098, China

123
530
B Skempton’s coefficient
Kd Drained bulk modulus
1 Introduction
Tight rocks, due to their low permeability and complicated
mechanical behaviors, are widely investigated in engi-
neering applications such as underground radioactive waste
disposal, shale gas and oil engineering and hydro-electric
projects. The tight marble, a kind of dense metamorphic
rocks, is the major rock mass of the left abutment slope of
the Jinping I Hydropower Station in Sichuan Province of
China (Wu et al. 2010; Zhou et al. 2006). The marble
formation of the left abutment slope is the major support of
the foundation below the elevation of 1730 m of the
worldwide highest arch dam (Wu et al. 2010). And thus it
is mandatory to make a full investigation of the mechanical
behaviors and permeability change of the marble and the
coupled effects.
Marble is a type of calcite rock whose mechanical
behaviors have been widely investigated worldwide (Baud
et al. 2000; Brantut et al. 2013; Covey-Crump et al. 2016;
Dresen and Evans 1993; Paterson and Wong 2005; Røyne
et al. 2011; Rutter 1972, 1974; Schubnel et al. 2005). It is
found that there is a range of confining pressure over which
transitional (or semi-brittle) deformation occurs for the
calcite rock (Dresen and Evans 1993; Fredrich et al.
1989, 1990; Paterson and Wong 2005). The differential
stress, mean stress, temperature, pore fluid chemistry and
initial microstructures (such as grain size, initial porosity
and microcracks) (Dresen and Evans 1993; Fredrich et al.
1990; Olsson and Peng 1976; Rutter 1974; Schmid et al.
1980; Schubnel et al. 2005) are all proved to have influence
on the mechanical behaviors of the calcite marble. A more
detail discussion on this point has been presented in the
review (Brantut et al. 2013; Paterson and Wong 2005) for
brittle rocks. Those former works have well addressed the
mechanical behaviors of the calcite rocks. However, cou-
pled hydro-mechanical behaviors are under investigation
due to the difficulty in realizing coupled measurement of
water permeability and mechanical deformation in low
permeability systems. Specific experimental design is thus
to be developed to investigate the coupled behaviors of the
low permeable marble.
Mechanical behaviors of the Jinping marble have been
also investigated in laboratory, and some achievements
(Guo et al. 2013; Qiu et al. 2014; Yang et al. 2007, 2009;
Zhang et al. 2011; Zhou et al. 2015; Zhu et al. 2005; Zuo
et al. 2015) have been obtained by different testing tech-
niques to quantify its strength behavior, damage evolution
and microstructural properties. Permeability tests on the
intact (Chen et al. 2008) and cracked (Liu et al. 2016a)
123
Z. Liu, J. Shao
marble have been carried out under hydrostatic stress by
some specific apparatus. However, coupled hydro-me-
chanical behaviors of the Jinping marble are still open due
to the long duration of water permeability test on tight and
low permeable rock, and thus further experimental tech-
niques and investigations are necessary. In the deep-buried
part of the Jinping I slope, unloading cracks have been
observed in high-stress area. Thus, it is necessary to
investigate also the unloading failure of the marble in a
high-stress state.
In low permeability systems, gases are usually used to
replace water as injection fluids (Brace 1980; Brace et al.
1968; Davy et al. 2007; Liu et al. 2015; Yang et al. 2010;
Zhang 2011) since gases have much smaller values of
dynamic viscosity (10-6 Pa s) than water (10-3 Pa s).
The dynamic viscosity difference of the two indicates that
the duration of gas permeability measurement can be
shortened about 1000 times of the water permeability
measurement under the same condition. In this case, gas
permeability measurement can be better coupled during
mechanical measurements (Liu et al. 2016b) than water
permeability measurement if the two types of testing
components can work independently. At present, experi-
mental data presenting coupled hydro-mechanical behav-
iors of tight rocks, especially those during the creep
process, are inadequate yet and thus further investigations
are necessary.
With the above considerations, the present study pro-
poses a series of experimental investigations on the hydro-
mechanical behaviors of the Jinping I marble with gas
permeability continuously measured in the process of
mechanical loadings. An experimental device is firstly
developed based on our coupled hydro-mechanical testing
system (Liu et al. 2016a) by incorporating the high-reso-
lution gas flow meters for measuring the outlet gas flow
with steady inlet gas injection during quasi-static
mechanical loadings. Then, hydrostatic test, conventional
triaxial test, creep test and lateral unloading test, with
steady gas flowing, are realized to characterize the
mechanical behavior and permeability change of the mar-
ble under triaxial compression. Differential stress-induced
damage of the marble is also investigated by some loading
cycles.
2 Material Characterization and Sample
Preparation
The tested material is cored in an intact marble formation
from a deep borehole at the left bank foundation site of the
arch dam of the Jinping I Hydropower Station, which is on
the ‘‘Jinping Bed’’ of the Yalong River in Liangshan,
Sichuan of China (Liu et al. 2014).
Strength Behavior, Creep Failure and Permeability Change of a Tight Marble Under Triaxial…
The intact gray marble is structured by the fine grains
with some white blocky crystals. Mercury injection test is
firstly carried out to quantify the physical and pore prop-
erties of the marble. Its physical properties are obtained in
Table 1. The total porosity of the marble is 1.68% which
indicates that it is a tight marble.
The cored fresh marble is cut by a diamond wire saw
and polished at both ends in laboratory to form a cylin-
drical geometry (see Table 2). The samples are then
exposed to air at room temperature for two months to keep
a dry state for ultrasonic wave velocity measurement. Both
the P-wave and S-wave velocities are measured for the
prepared samples given in Table 2 by a pair of P-wave and
S-wave ultrasonic transducers (transmitters) of size 25 mm
in diameter with the resonant frequency of 500 kHz. Then,
the dynamic Poisson ratio t can be calculated (Lautrup
2005) according to the measured wave velocities by Eq. (1)
v2P  2v2S
t¼ ; ð1Þ
2ðv2P  v2S Þ
where t is the dynamic Poisson, and vP and vS are,
respectively, the ultrasonic P- and S-wave velocities.
3 Experimental Apparatus and Method
3.1 Experimental Device and Procedure
The triaxial tests with fully coupled gas permeability
measurement are realized in an autonomous and auto-
compensated hydro-mechanical testing system (see Fig. 1)
designed at the Laboratory of Mechanics of Lille (LML).
The testing system is consisted of a data acquisition center
and three independent loading components, respectively,
for deviator stress loading, confining pressure application
and interstitial pressure generation and monitoring, which
are assembled in the triaxial cell. The continuous acquisi-
tion (every 2 s) of applied forces, pressures and flow rates,
displacements or deformations is realized, respectively, by
the force sensors, pressure sensors, flow meter, LVDT or
strain gages, and all recorded in the data acquisition center
(see Fig. 1).
The confining pressure is applied and maintained by an
ISCO D260 series pump with precision of 0.01 MPa. The
gas injection is controlled and maintained by a liquid gas
Table 1 Physical properties of tested marble by mercury injection test
Property Total pore area (m2/g) Median pore diameter (lm)
(V) (A)
Value 0.072 7.2724 0.0409
V volume, A area
531
cylinder and a manometer with precision of 0.01 MPa. The
gas flow is measured by a flow meter with the range of
[0.007, 0.7] ml/min in triaxial test and another one with the
range of [0.2, 72] ml/min in the creep tests. Both flow
meters are calibrated with the same way in factory and in
laboratory. The deviator stress in triaxial tests is loaded by
an INSTRON rigid loading machine with force precision of
0.01 KN. Axial strain (e1) is measured by a pair of LVDT
with precision in micrometer, and the radius strain (e3) is
measured by a high-precision circular ring (Secq 2010). In
triaxial creep tests, the deviator stress is loaded by an
autoservo high-pressure pump with precision of 0.01 MPa
and the strains are measured by two pairs of local strain
gages. During the mechanical loading, the nitrogen gas is
injected at a constant pressure at the inlet and the outlet gas
flow is continuously measured at the atmospheric pressure.
The triaxial tests with coupled gas permeability mea-
surement are carried out mainly in the following steps:
(i) Check each component of the testing system.
(ii) Install the sample at the base with a filter paper
and diffusive plate at both ends and seal it by a
plastic jacket.
(iii) Close the triaxial cell and apply the confining
pressure (Pc) in 30 min to the planned value and
maintain it.
(iv) Inject the nitrogen gas and maintain it at a planned
value (Pi) smaller than 1/10 of the Pc to minimize
the influence of the gas injection during deviatoric
stress (q) loading.
(v) Load the deviatoric stress at a constant axial strain
rate e_1 ¼ 3  106 =s after the strain and gas flow
both stabilize in hydrostatic stress state.
(vi) Realize the unloading–reloading cycles at some
levels of deviatoric stress to quantify the modulus
variations at the same axial strain rate
e_1 ¼ 3  106 =s.
The triaxial creep tests are carried out in a similar pro-
cedure to investigate the time-dependent behaviors of the
marble. Both one-step creep and multi-step creep tests are
realized to characterize the creep properties of the marble
under the confining stress of 30 MPa. In the multi-step
creep test, an unloading phase of the mean stress is exe-
cuted at the end of the multi-step creep phase to charac-
terize the excavation-induced failure behavior of the
Density (g/mL) Porosity (%)
(4 V/A) Bulk at 690 Pa Apparent
0.3476 2.6966 2.7428 1.6837
123
532 Z. Liu, J. Shao

Table 2 Sample geometry, ultrasonic velocity and test type and conditions
Sample no. Geometry (mm) Ultrasonic velocity (m/s) Poisson t Test type Pc (MPa)
Diameter Length P-wave S-wave

D2 36.60 58.65 4123 2574 0.181 Hydrostatic 1–40

K1 36.62 73.86 4680 3065 0.124 Coupled triaxial 4
J1 36.65 74.21 4120 2650 0.147 10
J2 36.56 73.35 4325 2789 0.144 20
J3 36.52 73.29 4242 2706 0.157 30
D1 36.68 74.08 4082 2518 0.193 30
B1 36.58 73.97 3162 2043 0.142 40
B2 36.56 73.09 3216 2089 0.135 Coupled creep 30
K3 36.59 73.52 4592 2998 0.129 Creep with unloading failure 30

Fig. 1 Schema of coupled

testing system

marble. For coupled permeability measurement, the excess Q LP0

kg ¼ l ; ð2Þ
fluid induced by material pore volume change during stress A Pm DPi
loading can no doubt affect the measurements if an
where kg is the gas permeability; l is dynamic viscosity of
incompressible fluid such as water is used. For this reason,
the injected nitrogen gas at the tested temperature and
we use the compressible inertial nitrogen gas as injected
pressure; Q is the outlet volumetric flow rate recorded by
fluid in the coupled tests.
the flow meter; L and A are, respectively, the sample length
and cross-sectional area; P0 , DPi and Pm are, respectively,
3.2 Gas Permeability Measurement
the outlet pressure, differential pressure and mean pressure
under steady flow conditions.
The permeability of the marble throughout the mechanical
The apparent gas permeability in Eq. (2) can be corre-
loading can be calculated by Eq. (2) for Darcy’s flow
lated with the instinct permeability of the material by
with compressible fluids in porous media (Wyckoff et al.
considering Klinkenberg’s effect (Klinkenberg 1941)
1933)

123
Strength Behavior, Creep Failure and Permeability Change of a Tight Marble Under Triaxial… 533

 
b kBKd
kg ¼ k 1 þ  ; ð3Þ D ; ð7Þ
P la
where k is the instinct permeability of the porous material; where k is the permeability, B and a are, respectively,
P is the mean flowing interstitial pressure at the flow sys- Skempton’s coefficient and Biot’s coefficient, l is the fluid
tem; b is Klinkenberg’s factor, a constant for a particular dynamic viscosity, and Kd is the drained bulk modulus. For
gas in a particular porous medium and can be obtained by the tight marble and nitrogen gas, k & 10-19 m2,
gas flowing tests at different flowing pressures. If we take P1 l = 1.75 9 10-6 Pa s, Kd & 30 GPa, a & 0.6, B & 1.0,
as horizontal axis and kg as the vertical axis for flowing one gets D & 3.4 9 10-2 m2/s. For l = 37 mm (half-
tests at different gas pressures, k is then the interception at sample length), one obtains t & 0.4 s, which indicates the
the kg axis and b is the slope. gas diffusion is very fast in the marble sample.
In fact, Eq. (2) is valid on condition that the Reynolds
number (Re) should satisfy
4 Experimental Results
Re\1 ð4Þ
In the present tests, the Reynolds number Re can be 4.1 Hydrostatic Compression
calculated as
The results of a hydrostatic stress compression test on the
vdq Q q
Re ¼ ¼ d ð5Þ sample D2 are shown in Fig. 2. The hydrostatic stress is
l A l
loaded at the rate of 0.97 MPa/min. Gas permeability and
In the triaxial tests, the maximum Re = 0.006 with the strain evolution are both given with the change of time and
given injection pressure and maximum flow value 0.7 ml/ hydrostatic pressure. The hydrostatic pressure is loaded in
min, which satisfies well with Eq. (4). In the triaxial creep three steps to show the viscous effect. The data are not
test, Eq. (4) requires that the flow Q\8:9 ml/min at the present in Fig. 2 when the gas flow is out of the range of
tested pressure. This flow value is in the range of the flow the flow meter at r3 = 40 MPa since the strains stabilize
meter. Thus, in the creep tests, we present the flow value
other than its gas permeability.
Under some circumstances, the outlet flow cannot be 0.20 ε (%) k (m2) 10 -17
ε1 ε3
measured by the used flow meter in the steady-state εv k σ3=40MPa
method. In this case, we take advantage of the designed 0.16
unit (Liu et al. 2016a) for the pulse decay method to σ3 =20MPa 10 -18
0.12
measure the gas permeability by incorporating the two inlet
and outlet reservoirs as shown in Fig. 1. In the pulse decay 0.08
measurement, the obtained gas permeability is a scatter and 10 -19
we take the value as the permeability of the median time of 0.04
σ3 =2MPa
the pulse decay process. Time (h)
0.00 10 -20
0 1 2 3 4 5
(a)
3.3 Characteristic Time for Gas Diffusion in Marble
Sample
0.20 ε (%) k (m2) 10-17
ε1 ε3
The permeability measurement on a deforming rock initi- εv k
0.16
ates the question that the measured flow may cause a big
10-18
error since it is in essence a transient value. A key point is 0.12
to check the characteristic time for gas diffusion in the
tested sample. The characteristic time t for diffusion over a 0.08
distance l can be approximated by (Carslaw and Jaeger 10-19
1959; Duda and Renner 2013; Ge and Stover 2000; Nicolas 0.04
et al. 2016) σ3 (MPa)
0.00 10-20
l2 0 10 20 30 40
t¼ ; ð6Þ
D (b)
where D is hydraulic diffusivity which can be approxi- Fig. 2 Strain and permeability evolution under hydrostatic pressure.
mated by (Kümpel 1991; Nicolas et al. 2016) a With time, b with hydrostatic pressure

123
534
prior to the gas flow. The strains in the hydrostatic stress
test are measured by local strain gages.
4.2 Triaxial Compression
The experimental results of the six coupled triaxial tests are
shown in Fig. 3a–f. The differential stress is loading by
controlling a constant axial strain rate of 3 9 10-6 le/s.
The loading of the differential stress in the triaxial com-
pression tests takes about 4–11 h varying with the level of
applied confining pressure. With this low loading rate, the
effect of gas excess induced by pore volume change can to
some extent be neglected during the differential stress
loading considering the characteristic time t for diffusion in
marble is 0.4 s. Also, the gas is a highly compressible fluid,
which will also reduce the gas excess due to sample vol-
ume change.
Five tests with different values of confining pressure are
realized with nitrogen gas injected for detection of crack
initiation and development during differential stress load-
ing. The gas permeability k is calculated by Eq. (2) from
the outlet flow measured by the flow meter. Due to the
range limitation of the flow meter, some scattered perme-
ability values have been obtained by the pressure pulse
decay method as shown in Fig. 3a, b. The photographs of
the samples after tests are shown in Fig. 4 in which the
fracture morphology is given. In each test, some loading–
unloading cycles are obtained to evaluate the change of
modulus under different stress states for damage detection.
The strength properties of these tests are shown in Fig. 5
with correlations of axial strength (r1) to confining stress
(r3) given for both peak and residual strength. The stress
circles and the fitting results of the strength with the Mohr–
Coulomb criterion are shown in Fig. 6. The unloading–
reloading moduli (E) obtained from the loading cycles of
the tests in Fig. 3 are shown in Fig. 7.
4.3 One-Step Triaxial Creep
The differential stress in the creep test is loaded by a
pressure pump at the loading rate of 3.6 MPa/min. The test
is carried out under confining pressure Pc = 30 MPa with
gas injection pressure Pi = 3 MPa at inlet. The outlet
pressure is equal to atmospheric pressure. The loaded
stresses and creep responses of the coupled one-step tri-
axial creep test are shown in Fig. 8. The creep rate and gas
flow evolution during the creep process are shown in
Fig. 9.
4.4 Multi-step Triaxial Creep
The results of the multi-step creep test with a failure phase
induced by unloading confining pressure are shown in
123
Z. Liu, J. Shao
Figs. 10 and 11. At the fourth step of differential creep
stress, the unloading phase is introduced by controlling the
unloading rate of the confining pressure as 0.5 MPa/min.
When macrofailure of the marble occurs, we can obtain the
critical confining pressure below which failure occurs
under the current deviatoric stress.
5 Discussion
5.1 Anisotropy Deformation Under Hydrostatic
Compression
It is shown in Fig. 2a, b that the strain and gas permeability
evolution can be divided into two phases under hydrostatic
compression. The first phase is an evident nonlinear phase
when the hydrostatic stress is lower than 20 MPa, and the
second one can be thought as a quasi-linear phase. These
characteristics can address that there are some pre-existing
microcracks in the marble and those cracks are compacted
quickly due to the hydrostatic stress loading. As the com-
paction arrives at a certain level, for example under
r3 = 20 MPa, further compaction of the cracks is more
difficult even under higher stress. Thus, the hydrostatic
stress has an important effect on the compaction of the pre-
existing cracks in the marble.
It is also indicated in Fig. 2 that the marble strains show
an evident anisotropic effect under the hydrostatic stress
loading. The radius strains are much larger than the axial
ones. The radius strain is about 2 times of the axial one
under r3 = 2 MPa. This ratio is, however, decreasing with
pressure and is, respectively, of 1.75 and 1.56 under
r3 = 20 and 40 MPa as can be indicated in Fig. 2a. Thus,
the anisotropic effect of the marble under hydrostatic stress
is evident and can be reduced by the stress.
The permeability decrease under r3 = 20 MPa may be
probably caused by the high loading rate of 0.97 MPa/min
of the hydrostatic pressure. At this loading rate, the
porosity and microstructural changes of the material need
time to balance, which causes that the diffusion time of the
flow is insufficient during the fast loading on the marble
regarding the diffusion time t = 0.4 s. At the same time,
the fast loading may cause the accumulation of gas in the
marble which needs time to excess. In this way, the flow at
the outlet is not the ‘‘true’’ value. Despite this, we use the
permeability value to show the rate-dependent effect in the
permeability measurement.
Thus, for continuous permeability measurement, the
loading rate should be made as low as possible to avoid
artifacts-induced time-dependent effect. However, almost
no time-dependent effect is observed for the material
strains at this rate of hydrostatic pressure loading. There-
fore, marble gas permeability seems more sensitive than
Strength Behavior, Creep Failure and Permeability Change of a Tight Marble Under Triaxial… 535

100 q (MPa) k (m2) 10-15 120 q (MPa) k (m2) 10-16

ε 100
80
ε 10-16
80 10-17
ε 60
k 60
10-17
k fractured40 ε
ε 40 10-18
10-18 εᵥ
20 k 20
ε (%) ε (%) k fractured ε (%)
0 10-19 0 10-19
-0.9 -0.6 -0.3 0 0.3 0.6 0.9 1.2 1.5 -1.6 -1.2 -0.8 -0.4 0 0.4 0.8 1.2 1.6
(a) Pc=4MPa (b) Pc=10MPa

160 -17
140 q (MPa) k (m2) 10-17 q (MPa) k (m2) 10
140
120
120
100 10-18
100
80
ε 10-18 ε 80
ε 60 ε
ε 60
εᵥ 10-19
k 40 k 40
20 20
ε (%) ε (%) ε (%) ε (%)
0 10-19 0 10-20
-1.6 -1.2 -0.8 -0.4 0 0.4 0.8 1.2 1.6 2 -3.5 -2.5 -1.5 -0.5 0.5 1.5 2.5 3.5 4.5
(c) Pc=20MPa (d) Pc=30MPa

160 q (MPa) 180 q (MPa) k (m2) 10-16

140 160
140 10-17
120
ε 120
100 ε 10-18
ε 100
80
80
60 10-19
ε 60
ε 40 Over the capacity
40 10-20
ε Over the range of ring of the flow meter
20 20
ε (%) ε (%) ε3 (%) ε (%)
0 0 10-21
-3.6 -2.7 -1.8 -0.9 0 0.9 1.8 2.7 3.6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5

(e) Pc=30MPa without gas injection (f) Pc=40MPa

Fig. 3 Results of triaxial tests with coupled gas permeability measurement

the material strains to the change of material microstruc- shown in Fig. 5. The correlation results in Fig. 5 imply
tural and porosity. that the relationship between the marble strength and the
applied confining pressure can be quantified by a linear
5.2 Strength, Strain and Permeability Change criterion
in Triaxial Test r1 ¼ A þ Br3 ; ð8Þ

5.2.1 Strength and Strain where A and B are material constants and can be obtained
from the experimental results shown in Fig. 5.
Both the peak strength and residual strength of the Here we consider the shearing failure criterion (M–C
marble augment linearly with the confining stress as model) for granular friction materials

123
536 Z. Liu, J. Shao

(a) Pc=4MPa (b) Pc=10MPa (c) Pc=20MPa (d) Pc=30MPa (e) Pc=30MPa (f) Pc=40MPa

Fig. 4 Photographs of samples after test with crack morphology

250 σ (MPa) 110 E (GPa)

Pc=40
200 σ = 3.2101σ + 81.39 Pc=30
R² = 0.9949 90 Pc=20
Pc=10
150 Peak Pc=4
Residual 70

100
σ = 4.9864σ + 8.8873
R² = 0.9895 50
50
ε1i/ε1peak
σ (MPa) 30
0 0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
0 10 20 30 40 50
Fig. 7 Unloading–loading moduli change during triaxial loading
Fig. 5 Strength of marble under different confining pressures under different values of confining pressure

140 1.6
τ (MPa) ε (%) Q (ml/min) 35
120 1.2 Creep starts q/10 (MPa)
30
100 Failure plane φ=32°
0.8
τ =c+ σ tanφ ε₁ εᵥ ε₃
Stress circles 25
80 0.4 Q q/10
60 0.0
20
0 2 4 6 T (h) 8 10
40 -0.4
c=22.7 15
20 -0.8
σ (MPa)
0 -1.2 10
-60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 200 220 240
-1.6
Pc=30MPa 5
Fig. 6 Stress circles at failure and strength criteria -2.0 ∆Pi=3MPa
-2.4 0
s ¼ c þ r tan u; ð9Þ
Fig. 8 Loading condition and creep response of one-step coupled
where s and r are, respectively, the shear stress and normal
triaxial creep test
stress on the shearing failure plane; c and u are, respec-
tively, material parameters regarding the cohesion and
friction angle. We finally have for this group of tight marble
Taking into account the geometrical relations between c ¼ 22:7; u ¼ 32 : ð11Þ
the stress circles as shown in Fig. 6, we have
The strength of the marble agrees well with the linear
2c cos u 1 þ sin u Mohr–Coulomb failure criterion c ¼ 22:7 MPa and u ¼
A¼ ; B¼ : ð10Þ
1  sin u 1  sin u 32 (see Fig. 6) by the least square regression method.

123
Strength Behavior, Creep Failure and Permeability Change of a Tight Marble Under Triaxial… 537

Creep time (h) -1.2%. For the test with confining pressure of 40 MPa, no
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 evident strength decrease is observed and thus the strains at
1.E-04 100
dε₃/dt 3 peak are not listed. Therefore, the deformation of the
dε₁/dt 2 marble at peak strength is much larger under higher values
1.E-05 Flow 10 of confining pressure than lower ones.
1 In addition, there is an evident transition point shown in
dε/dt (/s)

Gas flow
1 Decelerating phase

1.E-06 2 Quasi-linear phase

1 Fig. 3 at which the volumetric strains turn from the com-
3 Accelerating phase pression regime to dilation one. At failure, all the volu-
metric strains are in dilation regime. Thus, the failure of the
1.E-07 0.1
marble is dominated by the compression-induced dilation
which will be discussed below.
1.E-08 0.01
5.2.2 Failure Mode
Fig. 9 Flow and strain rate of one-step triaxial creep test
The failure behaviors of the marble shown in Fig. 3 are
1.5 strain (%) stress (MPa) 160 greatly dependent on the confining pressure. Strength of the
ε1
q4 140 marble under Pc = 4 MPa (Fig. 3a) decreases dramatically
0.5 q3 as soon as the peak strength is arrived. The failure process
120
is extremely brittle with the material strength decreasing
-0.5-100 200 500 800 1100 1400
q2 T (h) 100 more than three-fourth of its peak value. At the same time,
-1.5 80 the material strains augment doubly. During the brutal
q1 ε3 failure process, a macrofracture surface has been developed
60
-2.5 εv from one end to the other end of the sample as shown in
σ3 40 Fig. 4a.
-3.5 The strength under Pc = 10 MPa (Fig. 3b) also
20
ε₁ ε₃ εᵥ q σ₃ decreases evidently during the failure process. The failure
-4.5 0
is also brittle with a strength drop about 60% after peak and
Fig. 10 Creep response of multi-step triaxial creep test a strain increase about 0.5 times of its value at peak
strength. The swift brittle failure process also develops a
Unloading regime Creep regime Unloading regime macrocrack surface from one sample end to the other as
q q (MPa)140 σ3 (MPa) 40 shown in Fig. 4b.
Macro failure
q The marble can continue to undergo a certain amount of
120 35
deformation after the peak strength under Pc = 20 MPa
σ3 100 σ3 (Fig. 3c). The strength degradation due to macrofailure is
30
80 gentler than the former two values of Pc. The gentle brittle
25 failure occurs with a strength drop about 15% and a strain
60
augment \0.1 times. The failure process also develops a
20
40 macrocrack surface (see Fig. 4c).
Unloading σ3
20 15 The marble undergoes a large amount of strains after
ε3 (%) ε1 (%) peak before failure under Pc = 30 MPa as shown in
0 10
-4.5 -4 -3.5 -3 -2.5 -2 -1.5 -1 -0.5 0 0.5 1 1.5 Fig. 3d, e. The marble exhibits a semi-brittle failure pro-
cess with a small amount of stress degradation and strain
Fig. 11 Stress and strain relations of multi-step creep test with an enlargement. The macrocracks are also developed after
unloading phase of confining pressure failure (Fig. 4d, e), but the failure surface is less rough than
the former three cases and many small granular particles
Thus, the confining pressure can enhance importantly the are created in the fracture surface due to the friction of the
strength of the marble. particles under high stresses.
As shown in Fig. 3, both the axial and lateral strains of As shown in Fig. 3f, the marble strength under
the marble at the peak strength vary much with the con- Pc = 40 MPa seems to keep the same value and no evident
fining pressure. The axial strains at peak strength are about strength decrease is observed in the test although material
0.6, 0.75, 1.1 and 1.8%, respectively, for the confining strains continue to enlarge up to 5%. This characteristic
pressure of 4, 10, 20 and 30 MPa. The corresponding addresses that the marble under Pc = 40 MPa exhibits
radius strains are, respectively, of -0.3, -0.7, -0.8 and almost a perfect plastic behavior. However, a local shear

123
538
band and macrocrack have been developed as shown in
Fig. 4f. The failure mode classification (Evans et al. 2013)
suggests that the failure mode can be classified as semi-
brittle judging from the local plastic band and may be also
classified as ductile according to the large strains at plastic
deformation. Considering that the duration of the test may
be not sufficiently long to generate a strength decrease, the
failure mode is taken as semi-brittle according to the
shearing band (see Fig. 4f) observed after test.
Therefore, the failure mode of the marble is closely
related to the confining pressure. According to the above
analysis, Pc = 40 can be thought as the critical confining
pressure over which transitional deformation occurs in the
tested marble. This result agrees well with the results that
the confining pressure inducing transitional deformation is
in the range of 30–300 MPa for calcite rocks (Dresen and
Evans 1993; Fredrich et al. 1989, 1990; Paterson and Wong
2005).
5.2.3 Permeability Evolution
Considering the characteristic time t = 0.4 s for gas dif-
fusion in the marble sample and the small change of vol-
umetric strain measured, one can think that the effect of
continuous differential stress loading on permeability
measurement can be neglected under the constant strain
rate 3 9 10-6/s.
The gas permeability experiences an initial decrease
phase and then turns to increase during the deviatoric load-
ings in each test as shown in Fig. 3a–f. The turning points in
the axial strain space correspond to the initial yield stress of
the marble under different confining pressures.
Also, the variation of the gas permeability is affected by
the confining pressure. The permeability decrease phase is
more evident in higher confining pressures than in lower
ones. And it keeps increasing after the peak strength under
Pc = 4 and 10 MPa in which brittle failure occurs. But its
increase is very gentle under Pc = 20 MPa, and it shows
no increase under Pc = 30 and 40 MPa after the peak
strength.
Thus, the permeability and its variations during the
deviatoric loading are evidently influenced by the confining
pressure during the differential stress loading in the triaxial
compression tests.
5.2.4 Stress-Induced Damage by Modulus Variation
The decrease of the moduli can be related to the damage of
the marble (Peng et al. 2016); thus, some unloading–
reloading cycles are realized during the differential stress
loading to investigate the stress damage effect.
As shown in Fig. 7, the unloading–loading moduli firstly
increase at low differential stress states and then decrease
123
Z. Liu, J. Shao
progressively when material strain accumulates to create
microcracks in the sample. The unloading–loading moduli
are larger in higher confining pressures than in lower ones.
This phenomenon indicates that the confining pressure can
strengthen the rigidity of the marble in the undamaged
state.
The amplitude of the modulus decrease during the
constant strain rate loading is more evident in higher
confining pressures than in lower ones as indicated in
Fig. 7. Under lower values of confining pressure, the
marble undergoes only a small amount of plastic defor-
mation before failure as indicated in Fig. 3a–c. Plastic
deformation-induced microcracks can propagate easily and
connect fast when the marble subjected to lower values of
confining pressure. Under higher values of confining stress
(see Fig. 3d–f), the marble can undergo a large amount of
plastic deformation. The propagation and connection of the
induced microcracks are limited due to the high confining
stress. These mechanisms suggest the phenomenon that the
marble can withstand a larger amount of damage under
higher values of confining stress than lower ones.
Therefore, the unloading–loading modulus and its vari-
ation can be enhanced by the confining pressure in devia-
toric stress loading at a constant strain rate. The marble can
withstand a large amount of plastic damage under higher
values of confining pressure than under lower ones.
5.3 Deformation and Permeability Under One-Step
Creep
The one-step creep test in Fig. 8 shows that the marble has
a much larger axial strain than the radius one in triaxial
loading phase of the creep test. However, its radius strain
augments more importantly than the axial one during the
creep process as shown in Fig. 9. The radius strain rates are
much greater than the axial ones. At the start of creep, the
volume strain in Fig. 8 begins to transit from compression
to dilation due to fast increase of radius strain. The creep
rate in radius direction is about two times of that in axial
direction. These phenomena suggest that the creep failure
of the marble is caused by the compression-induced
shearing expansion in radius direction.
In addition, it is indicated in Fig. 9 that the marble
exhibits a clear three-stage creep before failure. That is the
primary, secondary (linear) and accelerated creep phase
(Brantut et al. 2013). The radius creep rate in secondary
creep is generally in the magnitude of 10-7/s that is about
one magnitude greater than the axial creep rate shown in
Fig. 9. The radius creep rate augments continuously, while
the axial one exhibits a sudden increase in tertiary creep
phase. This phenomenon indicates that the creep failure of
the marble is induced by the continuously radius dilation
under the confining pressure of 30 MPa.
Strength Behavior, Creep Failure and Permeability Change of a Tight Marble Under Triaxial… 539

The gas flow shown in Fig. 9 also exhibits three phases induced by the confining pressures in the tests shown in
during the creep of the marble. At the beginning of the Fig. 3.
creep, the gas flow exhibits an increasing phase with gas Thus, time-dependent deformation of the marble is
flow augmenting from 0.1 ml/min up to 7 ml/min in 3 h. closely related to the deviatoric stress level. When devia-
Then, the gas flow undergoes a quasi-linear increasing toric stress is \50% of peak strength, the marble exhibits
phase with flow value doubled to 14 ml/min in 5.5 h. no time-dependent deformation. Time-dependent defor-
Finally, the gas flow shows an accelerating phase increas- mation is more important in the radius direction than in the
ing dramatically up to 26 ml/min in 0.75 h. Since the gas axial direction. The unloading failure of the marble after
flow is very sensitive to microcracks in the material, it can multi-step creep phase under Pc = 30 MPa is characterized
be used to characterize the initiation and development of by its radius deformation as in the multi-step creep process.
the microcracks in the marble during the creep process. The unloading failure strength agrees well with the crite-
The gas flow in Fig. 9 indicates the microcracks initiate rion quantified in triaxial tests.
and develop swiftly in phase I in the sample. As the stress
keeps the same, the microcracks in the skeleton accumulate
and develop at a certain rate to engender new microcracks 6 Conclusion
for gas flowing in a quasi-linear increasing manner in phase
II. Once the microcracks have accumulated to a certain From the above experimental results and discussions, the
amount, they are connected to form macrocracks which can following conclusions can be drawn.
provide considerable pathway for gas flowing at an
1. The tested marble has an important anisotropic defor-
increasing big rate in the tertiary creep stage. Therefore,
mation under hydrostatic pressure, and this anisotropy
the gas flow is very sensitive to characterize the creep
can be reduced by the hydrostatic stress. The gas
behaviors of the marble during the three-state creep failure.
permeability is more sensitive than the strains to the
loading rate and inner porosity change of the marble.
5.4 Multi-step Creep Behaviors and Unloading
2. The gas permeability exhibits a decrease phase at
Failure
initial deviatoric loading and turns to increase at a
critical stress corresponding to the initial yield stress of
The multi-step creep test (see Fig. 10) is carried out to
the marble in triaxial loading tests.
investigate the differential stress effect on the creep
3. The failure process of the marble swifts from brutal
behaviors of the marble. The unloading phase of confining
brittle, swift brittle, brittle and semi-brittle as the
pressure (Fig. 11) is executed to characterize the failure
confining pressure augments from 4, 10, 20, 30 to
behaviors induced by some engineering excavation
40 MPa in triaxial loading conditions. Its strength can
activities.
be well described by a linear failure criterion. The
The creep deformation in Fig. 10 shows that there is
strains as well as the permeability-decreasing phase are
almost no time-dependent strains in the marble when the
enhanced by the confining pressure during the devia-
deviatoric stress is lower than 65 MPa (50% of peak
toric stress loadings. The unloading–loading modulus
strength) at Pc = 30 MPa. When deviatoric stress arrives
is also enhanced by the confining pressure and shows a
at its initial yield stress, the radius strain (e3) starts to
slight decrease under lower confining pressures but an
increase at a much greater rate than the axial ones. In
evident decrease under high confining pressures in
addition, it is evidently shown in Fig. 11 that the time-
deviatoric stress loadings.
dependent radius strains are much more important than the
4. The gas flow is more sensitive than the material
axial ones at failure by unloading r3.
strains to characterize the creep properties of the
The unloading phase starts at the deviatoric stress
marble in the constant stress test. Creep failure of
q = 130.6 MPa. As r3 decreases, the radius strains of the
the marble is triggered by compression-induced
marble increase dramatically, but there is no evident
shearing expansion. The secondary creep rate that
increase in the axial strains as shown in Fig. 11. The
can induce a tertiary creep is about 10-7/s in radius
strength of the marble does not decrease until r3 \ 23 MPa
direction and 10-8/s in axial direction for the tested
during the slow unloading process, which indicates that the
marble.
strength q of the marble should be 130.6 MPa at
5. The deformation of the marble shows little time-
Pc = 23 MPa. This value agrees well with the strength
dependent effect under Pc = 30 MPa when deviatoric
criteria obtained in triaxial tests shown in Fig. 6.
stress is \50% of its peak strength. Unloading failure
In addition, it is observed in Fig. 11 that the marble
of the marble is also characterized by its radius
behaves a semi-brittle failure in the unloading process,
deformation after a multi-step creep phase, and the
which also conforms to the transition of the failure modes

123
540
failure strength agrees well with the criterion obtained
in the triaxial tests.
Acknowledgements The authors thank Wei Wang for providing the
marble raw materials. The authors are grateful to Shouyi Xie, Jean
Secq and Jean-Pierre Parent for technical supports. The authors also
thank the Editors and the anonymous reviewers who provided helpful
constructive reviews that greatly improved the manuscript. The pre-
sent study is partially funded by the Natural Science Foundation of
China (No. 11272114) and National Basic (973) Research Program
(No. 2011CB013504).
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