Ultrasonic S-wave responses of single rock joints filled with wet bentonite clay

Clay minerals are prevalent in rock discontinuities and have significant effects on mechanical, hydraulic and seismic properties of rock masses. Understanding seismic behaviours across individual clay-rich rock joints is of great importance in the fields of geology and earth sciences. However, the wave responses of individual clay-rich rock joints have not been well understood until now. This paper reports a laboratory investigation of ultrasonic S-wave propagation and attenuation across single rock joints filled with bentonite clays with varying degree of water saturation. In this study, a series of acoustic measurements were conducted on specimens of the bentonite clay-filled rock joint using a self-developed ultrasonic pulse-transmission test system that equipped with a S-wave transducer pair with a dominant frequency of 250 kHz. Based on the obtained laboratory data, the wave velocity, transmission ratio and the time-frequency-energy distribution of the S-waves transmitted through the bentonite clay-filled joint were calculated and evaluated. The experimental results show that the degree of water saturation of the bentonite clay greatly affects S-wave responses of the filled rock joint. In particular, an increase in the degree of saturation causes a nonlinear decrease in S-wave velocity. In addition, as the water saturation of the bentonite clay increases, the wave attenuation decreases; the minimum wave attenuation is reached at a saturation degree of 71.4% and then the attenuation increases slightly. Additionally, with the increase of the water saturation, the magnitudes of the S-wave energy transmitted across the bentonite clay-filled joint firstly increases and then decreases. The S-wave energy is mostly stored in the frequency range of 150 - 300 kHz regardless of the degree of water saturation of the bentonite clay. This finding indicates that the frequency partition of the transmitted S-waves rarely changes with the changing water saturation. The present work could not only compensate for the lack of laboratory-based research on wave behaviours across clay-rich rock joints but also provides insights into the interpretation of acoustic data from field tests for detecting, characterizing and monitoring rock discontinuities.