Abstract
This paper shows the mechanism of fracture formation of rocks caused by thermalstress in the case of applying the inpulsive CO2 laser beam onto its surface.
The thermal stresses in the rock and the fracture propagation were simulated byaxi- symmetric finite element method (FEM).
The distribution of the surface temperature were observed by infrared TV cameraand the thermal displacement were measured by Ar+ laser holography.
The result of the simulation and the fractured section of rocks were displayed ya new 3-dimensional image system using a plane mirror.
In this simulation it has become clear that the great part of the fractured elementsoccurs at tensile stress region and the fractured region caused only by the thermal stress is limited.
