Abstract
The stability of rock slope is studied using the kinematic approach of yield design theory, under the condition of plane strain and by considering the last version of the Hoek-Brown failure criterion. This criterion, which is suitable to intact rock or rock mass highly fractured regarded as isotropic and homogeneous, is widely accepted by the rock mechanics community and has been applied in numerous projects around the world. The failure mechanism used to implement the kinematic approach is a log-spiral rotational mechanism. The stability analysis is carried out under the effects of gravity forces and a surcharge applied along the upper plateau of the slope. To take account of the effects of forces developed in the rock mass during the passage of a seismic wave, the conventional pseudo-static method is adopted. This method is often used in slope stability study for its simplicity and efficiency to simulate the seismic forces. The results found are compared with published numerical solutions obtained from other approaches. The comparison showed that the results are almost equal. The maximum error found is less than 1%, indicating that this approach is effective for analyzing the stability of rock slopes. The relevance of the approach demonstrated, investigations are undertaken to study the influence of some parameters on the stability of the slope. These parameters relate to the mechanical strength of the rock, slope geometry and loading.
Highlights
Analysis of the rock slope stability was often carried out using the limit equilibrium method and considering the Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion
Because of the arbitrary simplifying assumptions on which it is based, the solution provided by limit equilibrium method is considered not rigorous in a strict mechanical sense
The seismic and static stability of homogeneous and isotropic rock slopes have been studied using the kinematic approach of the yield design theory combined with the pseudo-static method
Summary
Analysis of the rock slope stability was often carried out using the limit equilibrium method and considering the Mohr-Coulomb failure criterion. This work deals with the study of the static and seismic stability of homogeneous isotropic rock slope obeying the most recent version of the Hoek-Brown failure criterion [27] and using the kinematic approach of yield design theory. This method constitutes a generalization of the limit analysis [28,29,30]. This will properly reflect the non-linearity of the criterion
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