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Rock blasting during tunneling has shown that the rock failure in high in situ stress environments is different from that in low in situ stress conditions or with a shallow rock mass. In particular, the propagation direction of the main crack induced by blasting is greatly affected by the in situ stresses. In order to study the law of crack propagation in rock during blasting under the conditions of an initial in situ stress, a transparent material that conformed to the mechanical properties of hard rock was used to carry out a similar model rock blasting test, under a unidirectional load. The results show that initial stress has a great influence on the propagation number, length, and direction of the main radial cracks. The specific performances were as follows: under the action of an equal confining pressure load, the longest main radial crack in the model specimen propagated along the diagonal direction, and the number and length of the main radial cracks propagated decreased with the gradual increase of confining pressure stress, in addition, the diameter of the circumferential cracks also decreased with the increase of stress, and there was a negative correlation between them. In view of the phenomenon where the longest main radial crack propagated along the diagonal direction in the model test, a mechanical model was established in this study to explain this process. This is of practical significance for understanding the mechanism of rock fracture when blasting with high in situ stresses.

In order to study the fragmentation energy dissipation characteristics of cemented sand specimens under confining pressure and impact loads, the energy consumption of cemented sand specimens was analyzed through an impact compression and split test performed at different loading rates with different impact pressures by using a variable cross section SHPB (split Hopkinson pressure bar) with an active confining pressure loading apparatus. The results show that (1) the absorbed energy and incident energy were in a linear relationship and the proportion between them was relatively constant under confining pressure, and the absorbed energy had a quadratic relationship with the incident energy under zero confining pressure. (2) The fracture energy ratio increased with the increase in incident energy, the damage energy ratio decreased with the increase in incident energy, and the damage energy ratio were always higher than the fracture energy ratio under confining pressure. (3) The energy absorbed by the cemented sand specimens decreased sharply with the increase of confining pressure under the same incident wave energy conditions, and the reflected wave energy and transmitted wave energy increased. (4) When the incident wave energy was constant, the ratio of the energy causing surface fractures to the energy absorbed by the cemented sand specimens decreased sharply with the increase of confining pressure, while the energy causing crack growth and damage increased sharply. These conclusions may guide similar models of blasting tests in the future.

At present, a similar material most commonly used in the similarity model experiment of rock blasting is cement mortar. However, it is not transparent, which leads to the problem that the cracks in the model made of cement mortar after the test cannot be observed directly. Therefore, a kind of transparent hard rock-like material that can replace the existing model material to solve the above problem was developed in this study. This transparent hard rock-like material is made of a mixture of rosin saturated solution (RSS), epoxy resin (ER), and curing agent (CA), and its physical and mechanical properties are similar to those of hard rock through relevant tests. In addition, it is found through the blasting model test that the model specimen made of transparent hard rock-like materials has the characteristic of “direct observation” after blasting test, which conforms to the rock blasting fracture mechanism. Hence, it can replace the existing nontransparent model materials to be applied in rock blasting similar model experiment. The results from this study are helpful to the further experimental study of blasting crack propagation in deep rock mass.