Influence of Penetration Rate and Indenter Diameter in Strength Measurement by Indentation Testing on Small Rock Specimens

Abstract Indentation testing has been developed as an unconventional method to determine intact rock strength using small rock specimens within the size of drill cuttings. In previous investigations involving indentation testing, researchers have used different indenter stylus geometries, penetration rate (PR) and specimen sizes. These dissimilarities can restrict applications of this method for strength measurement and lead to non-comparable results. This paper investigates the influence of indenter diameter (ID) and PR on indentation indices for carbonate rocks to provide objective comparison and application of the existing correlations. As part of this research, several indentation tests were conducted using different IDs and PRs. The laboratory test results showed that indentation indices can be affected by ID while PR has only minor effect on the indentation indices. Thus, a normalizing function was presented to reduce the dependency of test results to ID. Verification of the findings with independent data confirms the suitability of the suggested normalizing function in determining the rock uniaxial compressive strength using testing data obtained from various IDs and PRs.

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