The T-stress solutions for through-wall circumferential cracks in cylinders subjected to general loading conditions

The elastic T-stress is a parameter used to define the level of constraint at a crack tip. It is important to provide T-stress solutions for practical geometries to apply the constraint-based fracture mechanics methodology. In the present work, T-stress solutions are provided for circumferential through-wall cracks in thin-walled cylinders. First, cylinders with a circumferential through-wall crack were analyzed using the finite element method. Three cylinder geometries were considered; defined by the mean radius of the cylinder (R) to wall thickness (t) ratios: R/t = 5, 10, and 20. The T-stress was obtained at eight crack lengths (θ/π = 0.0625, 0.1250, 0.1875, 0.2500, 0.3125, 0.3750, 0.4375, and 0.5000, θ is the crack half angle). Both crack face loading and remote loading conditions were considered including constant, linear, parabolic and cubic crack face pressures and remote tension and bending. The results for constant and linear crack face pressure were used to derive weight functions for T-stress for the corresponding cracked geometries. The weight functions were validated against several linear and non-linear stress distributions. The derived weight functions are suitable for T-stress calculations for circumferential cracks in cylinders under complex stress fields.