Damage failure of cemented backfill and its reasonable match with rock mass

Abstract In order to study the failure mechanism of backfill and the reasonable matches between backfill and rock mass, and to achieve the object of safe and efficient mining in metal mine, four types of backfills were tested under uniaxial compression loading, with cement–tailing ratios of 0.250:1, 0.125:1, 0.100:1 and 0.083:1, respectively. With the help of the stress–strain curves, the deformation and failure characteristics of different backfills with differing cement–tailing ratios were analyzed. Based on the experimental results, the damage constitutive equations of cemented backfills with four cement–tailing ratios were proposed on the basis of damage mechanics. Moreover, comparative analysis of constitutive model and experimental results were made to verify the reliability of the damage model. In addition, an energy model using catastrophe theory to obtain the instability criteria of system was established to study the interaction between backfill and rock mass, and then the system instability criterion was deduced. The results show that there are different damage characteristics for different backfills, backfills with lower cement–tailing ratio tend to have a lower damage value when stress reaches peak value, and damage more rapidly and more obviously in failure process after peak value of stress; the stiffness and elastic modulus of rock mass with lower strength are more likely to lead to system instability. The results of this work provide a scientific basis for the rational strength design of backfill mine.