Numerical modelling of heat shock-assisted rock fracture

This paper presents a numerical investigation on the effects of thermal shock as a pretreatment of rock prior to comminution. More specifically, the effect of heat shock-induced cracks on the uniaxial compressive strength of rock is numerically studied. The chosen constitutive model of rock employs a (strong) embedded discontinuity finite element formulation to describe cracks. The thermomechanical problem that governs the heat shock pretreatment of rocks is considered as an uncoupled problem because of a highly dominating role of the external heat influx. Two solution methods of the global problem are presented: an explicit-explicit dynamic scheme and an implicit-implicit quasi-static scheme. The model performance is tested in simulations on heterogeneous numerical rock samples subjected first to a heat shock pretreatment and then to a mechanical compression test. According to the results, the compressive strength of intact granite rock having the axial splitting failure mode can be substantially reduced by heat shock pretreatment.