Self-healing capacity of damaged rock salt with different initial damage

In order to analyze the healing effectiveness of rock salt cracks affected by the applied stresses and time, we used the ultrasonic technology to monitor the ultrasonic pulse velocity (UPV) variations for different initial stress-damaged rock salts during self-healing experiments. The self-healing experiments were to create different conditions to improve the microcracks closure or recrystallized, which the self-healing effect of damaged salt specimens were analyzed during the recovery period about 30 days. We found that: The ultrasonic pulse velocity of the damaged rock salts increases rapidly during the first 9 days recovery, and the values gradually increase to reach constant values after 30 days. The damaged value and the healed value were identified based on the variation of the wave velocity. The damaged values of the specimens that are subject to higher initial damage stress are still keeping in large after 30 days recovery under the same recovery condition It is interesting that the damage and the healing were not in the linear relationship, and there also existed a damage threshold for salt cracks healing ability. When the damage degree is less than the threshold, the self-healing ratio of rock salt is increased with the increase in damage degree. However, while the damage degree exceeds the threshold, the self-healing ratio is decreased with the increase in damage.