Abstract: The unified technical standards on the conservation engineering of historic buildings and sites are very limited in the world; the investigation combined with geomechanics and conservation methods research is becoming more and more important in the field of ancient buildings conservation, especially to the protection engineering of landmarks located on the slopes. This paper describes the damage analysis process and conservation approaches selection to the West Scriptures Printing Hall of Potala Palace in Tibet. The structural stability and possible damage under gravity and earthquake load is analyzed. Rock engineering techniques and structural analysis method are applied to explore the bedrock mass properties and structural characteristics. The main three factors which influences the stability of the West Scriptures Printing Hall are achieved, such as heterogeneous property of bedrock mass, stiffness difference of the structure and heterogeneous distribution of structural load. Futhermore, the ground stress characteristics in the bedrock are analyzed and the mechanisms of deformation and foundation subsidence under comprehensive effects of the main three factors are explored by numerical simulation , which can provide a lot of useful experiences on the conservation engineering of landmarks located on the slopes.

Key words: ancient buildings on the slope, bedrock property, heterogeneity, stress analysis