3D printing

3D printed fracture surfaces

Contact compliance and hydraulic conductivity play an important role in hydraulic fracture. Experimental studies on fractured rocks provide valuable data but do not allow for the fracture surfaces to be prescribed, hence the link between fracture topology and mechanical properties remains unclear. By creating 3D printed replica of real and artificial fracture surfaces this relation can be explored with minimal effort. The experimental studies are complemented with finite element simulations to further understand the effect of the roughness statistics.