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Contribution of detonation gas to fracturing reach in rock blasting: insights from the combined finite-discrete element method

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Abstract

The action of the detonation gas can be considerably affected by the conditions under which the blast occurs. In order to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of the contribution of detonation gas to fracturing reach, the combined finite-discrete element method (FDEM) is performed to modelling rock blasting under three different circumstances: i. single-borehole blasting without free surface under different in situ stress, ii. single- and multi-borehole blasting with a nearby free surface, and iii. underground contour blasting. The results indicated that: (1) detonation gas contributes significantly to the fracturing reach in single-borehole blasting without free surface, but the pneumatic increase factor (PIF) decreases with the increase in isotropic in situ stress; (2) under anisotropic in situ stress, the contribution of detonation gas to the fracturing reach is significant in the direction of maximum principal pressure but negligible in the direction of minimum principal pressure; (3) the PIF of single-borehole blasting with a nearby free surface is even smaller than that of single-borehole blasting under the hydrostatic pressure of 40MPa, indicating that the nearby free surface weakens the contribution of detonation gas to fracturing reach; (4) due to multi-borehole interaction combined with free surface effect, detonation gas contributes little to the fracturing reach in muti-borehole blasting with a nearby free surface. (5) due to the combined effect of anisotropic in situ stress, free surface and muti-borehole interaction, the contribution of detonation gas to the excavation damage depth can be negligible in underground contour blasting.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2020YFA0711802), National Nature Science Foundation of China (U22A20239) and Wuhan Science and Technology Bureau of China. We would like to thank Dr. Xiaofeng Li for his suggestions on manuscript writing. The authors acknowledge the constructive comments from the anonymous reviewers and the editor.

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  1. State Key Laboratory of Geomechanics and Geotechnical Engineering, Institute of Rock and Soil Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan, 430071, China

    Ben Wang & Haibo Li

  2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Ben Wang & Haibo Li

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Wang, B., Li, H. Contribution of detonation gas to fracturing reach in rock blasting: insights from the combined finite-discrete element method. Comp. Part. Mech. 11, 657–673 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40571-023-00645-3

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