Modified Mohr–Coulomb criterion for nonlinear strength characteristics of rocks

Abstract

The classical Mohr–Coulomb criterion has an extremely wide range of applications in the field of engineering geology, while it cannot accurately characterize rock failure under high confining stresses. Therefore, a nonlinear modification is implemented based on the Mohr–Coulomb criterion for achieving wider usage in all stress environments. The cohesion and internal friction angle are firstly calculated by regression based on the triaxial experiments of diorite and other typical rocks in different confining stress ranges, and the variation modes of cohesion and internal friction angle are then formalized and integrated into the classical Mohr–Coulomb criterion. Using the experimental results of 435 triaxial compression tests in existing publications, the predictions of the modified criterion are compared with those of the previous nonlinear criteria, which show that the predicted values of the modified criterion are in good agreement with the measured strength. Compared with the previous nonlinear criteria, the modified criterion has a wider application range and always maintains a higher accuracy.