Program Assumptions

There are some important limitations and assumptions of the RocSlope3 program that should be considered when interpreting the results:

• Block Failure should be analyzed along slopes cut in hard rock where discontinuities are discrete (finite).
• Displacements take place along the Joints and Blocks move as rigid bodies with no internal deformation or cracking.
  
• Blocks can be formed by any number of Joint Intersections (e.g., planar failure occurs on one Joint, wedge failure occurs on two or more Joints, etc.).
• The Location, Orientation, and extents of Joints dictate possible Joint Intersections and formation of Blocks (i.e., non-ubiquitous Joints). How and if Joints intersect will determine if a Block can form, its Geometry (which has an impact on Removability) and dimensions (i.e., volume).
• Rock mass strength and rock bridging is not considered where Joints do not sufficiently persist to form closed volumes.
• Without the consideration of external Loads and Supports, only gravitational loading due to self-weight is modeled as the driving force in limit equilibrium analysis to compute the Factor of Safety.
• Without the consideration of external Loads and Supports, only Shear Strength along sliding Joints is modeled as the resisting force in limit equilibrium analysis to compute the Factor of Safety.
• Unit Blocks refer to the individual blocks that can form via joint intersections. The force distribution reported for each unit block refers to the driving and resisting forces on that block only (e.g., weight of unit block, shear resistance on joint faces of unit block). The forces reported for a unit block residing in a block cluster do not account for the effects of other blocks in the cluster.
• Combined blocks refer to clusters of unit blocks. A combined block consists of at least two unit blocks. The force distribution reported for each combined block refers to the total driving and resisting forces on the entire combined block volume. Hence, a combined block analysis is the recommended analysis for stabilization design of block clusters.