Case Study on Failure Mode of Medium-Weathered Mudstone Based on PLT-BVM Methods and Its Bearing Capacity.

In the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle in China, the recommended bearing capacity of a medium-weathering mudstone foundation is less than the capacity of the rock structure to withstand loads. The aim of this paper was to perform plate loading tests (PLTs) with binocular vision measurement (BVM) to obtain the accurate deformation of the foundation under vertical loading. The results revealed that vertical load–bearing foundations have a failure mode that can be reduced to that of thrust failures for thin bedded structures of mudstone foundations. By analyzing the differences in results between the PLTs and the uniaxial compressive strength tests under the same conditions, a new formalism for calculating foundation-bearing capacity was proposed; there is only a 5% difference compared to in situ tests. The results of this research provide theoretical support and a practical benchmark for the full development of the load-bearing capability of soft red rocks. As the Chengdu-Chongqing economic circle progresses toward the international urban cluster, inevitably, soft rock is used as a foundation retaining layer in the construction of superhigh and super-rise buildings in the region. However, owing to antiquated testing methods and poor intelligibility of the testing equipment, the bearing capacity of such a mass of rock has yet to be fully developed and cannot meet the dual-carbon economic goals and sustainable development of architectural design. Based on this, the study introduces a noncontact method to measure the bearing capacity of soft rock within the traditional method of in situ testing and combines the concept of big data analysis to advance an empirical method for calculating the bearing capacity accurately. Based on the results of this study, the concept of natural foundations can be adopted and the engineering dilemma that the treatment of building foundations cannot be economical and practical can be solved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]