A novel 3D geometrical reconstruction model for porous rocks

In this paper, a novel geometrical reconstruction model is proposed for numerical simulation of pore structure in rocks. The spatial configuration and geometrical information of the microstructure are firstly gathered from Chongqing sandstone by X-ray micro-CT observations, and experimental tests on Chongqing sandstone are applied to obtain the mechanical parameters. Then, on the basis of the gathered geometrical information, the surface geometrical model is established by using the modified Marching cubes algorithm. Next, the established surface geometrical model is extended to 3D tetrahedral model by using Delaunay refinement algorithm. Finally, the 3D tetrahedral model is transformed into finite element (FE) numerical model. Moreover, the relationship between the porosity, fractal dimension of pore structure and mechanical properties of Chongqing sandstone is also investigated. The comparison of the numerical results and the experimental data shows a good consistency.