Effect of sampling interval on the output statistics of large 3D discontinuity surfaces generated by a multiscale random field model

• Published in: IOP conference series. Earth and environmental science Vol. 833; no. 1; pp. 12045 - 12052
• Main Authors: Jeffery, M, Huang, J, Fityus, S, Giacomini, A, Buzzi, O
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Bristol IOP Publishing 01.08.2021
• Subjects: Discontinuity; Fields (mathematics); Roughness; Sampling; Scale effect; Shear strength; Statistics; Stochastic processes; Stochasticity
• ISSN: 1755-1307; 1755-1315
• DOI: 10.1088/1755-1315/833/1/012045

Abstract The scale effect is known to hinder reliable shear strength estimation of large-scale discontinuities. Recently, a stochastic approach was proposed to predict shear strength of large discontinuities directly at problem scale, thereby bypassing the scale effect. One aspect of the stochastic approach seeks to use the available roughness information from the 1D profile of a discontinuity to create a series of statistically representative 3D synthetic rock surfaces, via a rigorous random field model. The application procedure for producing such synthetic surfaces was validated at small scale; however, preliminary large-scale applications were not quite satisfactory. It was found that the absence of consideration for the multiscale nature of discontinuity roughness contributed to the issues encountered. This paper presents the details of the revised multiscale-based 2D LAS approach for producing representative large-scale synthetic surfaces with an emphasis on the effect of sampling interval, called segment length, on the statistics of the synthetic surfaces.