Mechanical characteristics of soil-rock mixtures containing macropore structure based on 3D modeling technology

Soil-rock mixtures containing macropore (SRMCM) is a kind of geological material with special mechanical properties. Located in the project area of Lenggu hydropower station on the Yalong River, Sichuan Province, China, there is an extremely unstable Mahe talus slide with a total volume of nearly 160 million cubic meters, which is mainly composed of SRMCM. The study on the mechanical properties of SRMCM is of great significance for the engineering construction and safe operation. In this paper, laboratory tests and discrete element numerical tests based on three-dimensional scanning technology were conducted to study the influence of stone content, stone size, and the angle of the macropore structure on shear characteristics of SRMCM. The failure mechanism of SRMCM was discussed from a microscopic perspective. This work explains the internal mechanism of the influence of stone content, stone size, and the angle of the macropore structure on the strength of SRMCM through the microscopic level of stone rotation, force chain distribution, and crack propagation. As the macropore structure that intersects with the preset shear plane at a large angle could act as a skeleton-like support to resist the shear force, the fracture of the weak cemented surface of soil and stone in the macropore structure is an important cause of SRMCM destruction.