ABSTRACT

ABSTRACT: Determination of the deformability of jointed rock masses is an important part of rock engineering. Because of their simplicity, empirical relations relating the rock mass deformation modulus to RQD are widely used. However, the existing empirical relations suffer from a scarcity of data in the range RQD<60%, although it is extremely important in practice to consider rock masses with RQD<60%. In this paper, additional data were collected so that the entire range 0 = RQD = 100% is covered. Based on the collected data and the discussion of the reasons for the large scatter of the data, a new set of relations between the rock mass deformation modulus and RQD was developed and suggestions for using the new relations to estimate the rock mass deformation modulus are presented.

This content is only available via PDF.
You can access this article if you purchase or spend a download.