Experimental study on mechanical and acoustic emission characteristics of red sandstone containing combined flaws of hole–fissure under biaxial compression

To investigate the mechanical behaviour and failure mechanism of flawed rock masses under biaxial stress conditions, a series of biaxial compression experiments are conducted on red sandstone specimens containing combined flaws of the circular hole and perforated symmetric fissure combined with acoustic emission (AE) technology in this work. The results show a close association between the stress–strain curve morphology and confining stress, both the biaxial compression strength and elastic modulus exhibit an upward trend with increasing fissure angle and confining stress. The maximum AE energy and cumulative AE energy both increase with higher confining stress. The crack types in the specimens are identified by analyzing the average frequency/rise time/amplitude value distribution, revealing a gradual decrease in the percentage of tensile cracks with increasing fissure angle. An AE localization algorithm based on the least absolute value method is applied to pinpoint AE events during biaxial compression, and AE events distribution is analyzed through the kernel density estimation. The crack extension behaviour is described based on the movement of the maximum kernel density points, which initially exhibits a progression from both ends of the specimen toward the central region and subsequently from the central fissure tip toward the two ends.