COMPUTERIZED TOMOGRAPHY EXAMINATIONOF DAMAGE TESTS ON ROCKS UNDER TRIAXIAL COMPRESSION

Abstract

A real-time computerized tomography (CT) scanning equipment was developed for studying the damage evolution law of rocks during triaxial compression tests. The CT unit gave all information of the materials with different densities in a special plane of the observed object. A sub-system of hydraulic loading, a special chamber, a sub-system for cooling circulation and a sub-system of data-processing were combined to form the testing system. The results show that the triaxial CT testing gave clear images of the micro-voids development of rock material in such steps as closing-up of voids, fracture initiation, branching, development of micro-cracks, rupture, failure and unloading.