Numerical investigation on the effect of fracture filling material on P-wave propagation

The P-wave propagation through fractured rock mass is simulated using UDEC with a cohesive fracture model. A series of laboratory tests from literature on P-wave propagation through rock mass containing single fracture and two parallel fractures are introduced and the numerical model used to simulate these laboratory tests are described. The simulation results show that the proposed model, particularly the cohesive fracture model can capture very well the wave propagation characteristics in rock mass with un-welded and welded fractures with and without filling materials. In the meantime, in order to identify the significance of fracture on wave propagation, filling material with different particle sizes and the fracture thickness are discussed, and both factors are found to be crucial for wave attenuation.