Effect of Colluvial Soil Slope Fracture’s Anisotropy Characteristics on Rainwater Infiltration Process

Abstract

The SEEP/W module of finite element software GEO‐slope is used to analyze the effects of fracture depth, permeability coefficient ratio, fracture angle, and fracture number on the rainwater infiltration process. Moreover, the effect of fracture seepage anisotropy on slope stability is discussed combining with unsaturated seepage theory. The results show that the pore water pressure in the fracture increases rapidly with the rainfall until it changes from negative pressure to positive pressure. The greater the fracture depth is, the greater the pore water pressure in the fracture is, and the greater the infiltration depth at the time of rainfall stopping is. When the permeability coefficient is greater than the rainfall intensity, the permeability coefficient ratio has a great influence on the infiltration process of rainwater. The smaller the fracture angle is, the greater the maximum pore water pressure is in the fracture depth range, and the greater the depth of the positive pore water pressure is. However, with the increase of fracture angle, the infiltration depth decreases, and the range of the surface saturation area of slope increases obviously. With the increase of fracture density, the saturated positive pressure region is connected to each other in the slope. The influence range and the degree of the rainwater on the seepage field are larger and larger. There is a power relation between the saturation area and the fracture number, and also the concentration distribution of long fractures directly forms the large‐connected saturated zone and raises groundwater. The range of the saturated zone and variation law of the pore water pressure under fracture seepage are obtained, which provide a reference for the parameter partition assignment of slope stability analysis under fracture seepage.