Abstract

Direct shear tests were carried out on the rock joints and artificial discontinuities to investigate the influence of joint roughness on the shear strength and deformation behaviour. Single direct shear testing apparatus used in experiment was designed and manufactured. Its capacity is 200 tons of shear load, 20 tons of normal load and 50$\textrm{cm}^2$ of maximum shear area. Test samples were cement mortar with artificial discontinuity and sandstone with natural joint. Peak shear strength was increased as joint roughness or normal stress was increased, especially, linearly increased with roughness angle in cement mortar. If joint roughness angle was constant at low normal stress, shear strength was not affected by width and height of joint roughness in cement mortar. Peak shear strengths obtained from tests were larger than the values calculated by Barton's equation, and shear stiffness was increased with joint roughness coefficient.

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