XFEM Simulation of blast-induced crack propagation in rocks

Simulation of rock blasting is a challenging task in computational mechanics given the multiphysics and multiscale nature of the phenomenon. Among the several numerical methods available to deal with this problem, the Extended Finite Element Method (XFEM) presents some advantages since it can perform arbitrary crack propagation without remeshing and elements containing a crack are not required to conform to crack edges. In this research XFEM is applied to investigate rock blasting based on the phantom node method where discontinuities in the displacement fields are introduced through new degrees of freedom in overlapping elements. Some specific aspects related to the fracturing of a rock mass subjected to a general bench blast are discussed, such as the influence of mesh refinement, the effects of the stress-loading rate and the number and distribution of preexisting cracks around the blast hole. The numerical results are compared with those obtained by other authors using different numerical approaches, which confirms the suitability of XFEM to simulate dynamic fracture propagation problems.