Coupled behaviour of interacting dielectric cracks in piezoelectric materials

Existing studies indicate that the commonly used electrically impermeable and permeable crack models may be inadequate in evaluating the fracture behaviour of piezoelectric materials in some cases. In this paper, a dielectric crack model based on the real electric boundary condition is used to study the electromechanical behaviour of interacting cracks arbitrarily oriented in an infinite piezoelectric medium. The electric boundary condition along the crack surfaces is governed by the opening displacement of the cracks. The formulation of this nonlinear problem is based on modelling the cracks using distributed dislocations and solving the resulting nonlinear singular integral equations using Chebyshev polynomials. Numerical simulation is conducted to show the effect of crack orientation, crack interaction and electric boundary condition upon the fracture behaviour of cracked piezoelectric media.     

The nonlinear fracture behavior of an arbitrarily oriented dielectric crack in piezoelectric materials

Summary. This paper presents a comprehensive study on the plane problem of an arbitrarily oriented crack in a piezoelectric medium. Using a dielectric crack model, the electric boundary condition along the crack surfaces is assumed to be governed by the opening displacement of the crack. The formulation of this nonlinear problem is based on the use of Fourier transform and solving the resulting nonlinear singular integral equations. Multiple deformation modes are observed according to different geometric and loading conditions. The effects of the crack orientation and the applied loads upon the fracture behavior of cracked piezoelectric materials are studied. The relation between the current crack model and the commonly used permeable and impermeable models is discussed.     

二维压电材料动强度因子的扩展有限元计算

采用扩展有限元求解二维弹性压电材料动断裂问题。扩展有限元的网格独立于裂纹,因此网格生成可大大地简化,且裂纹扩展时不需重构网格。采用相互作用积分技术计算动强度因子。比较了标准的力裂尖加强函数和力-电裂尖加强函数对动强度因子的影响,结果表明标准的力裂尖加强函数能有效地分析压电材料动断裂问题。分析了极化方向对动强度因子的影响。数值分析表明采用扩展有限元获得的动强度因子与其他数值方法解吻合得很好。     

Three-dimensional extended displacement discontinuity method for vertical cracks in transversely isotropic piezoelectric media

The conventional displacement discontinuity method is extended to study a vertical crack under electrically impermeable condition, running parallel to the poling direction and normal to the plane of isotropy in three-dimensional transversely isotropic piezoelectric media. The extended Green's functions specifically for extended point displacement discontinuities are derived based on the Green's functions of extended point forces and the Somigliana identity. The hyper-singular displacement discontinuity boundary integral equations are also derived. The asymptotical behavior near the crack tips along the crack front is studied and the ordinary 1/2 singularity is obtained at the tips. The extended field intensity factors are expressed in terms of the extended displacement discontinuity on crack faces. Numerical results on the extended field intensity factors for a vertical square crack are presented using the proposed extended displacement discontinuity method.     

Non-local theory solution of a mode-I crack in a piezoelectric/piezomagnetic composite material plane

The non-local theory solution of a mode-I permeable crack in a piezoelectric/piezomagnetic composite material plane was given by using the generalized Almansi’s theorem and the Schmidt method in this paper. The problem was formulated through Fourier transform into two pairs of dual integral equations, in which the unknown variables are the displacement jumps across the crack surfaces. To solve the dual integral equations, the displacement jumps across the crack surfaces were directly expanded as a series of Jacobi polynomials. Numerical examples were provided to show the effects of the crack length and the lattice parameter on the stress field, the electric displacement field and the magnetic flux field near the crack tips. Unlike the classical elasticity solutions, it is found that no stress, electric displacement and magnetic flux singularities are present at the crack tips in piezoelectric/piezomagnetic composite materials. The non-local elastic solution yields a finite hoop stress at the crack tip, thus allowing us to use the maximum stress as a fracture criterion.     

Interaction of a dipole with an interfacial crack in piezoelectric media

We have studied the interaction of an electric dipole with an interface crack between two dissimilar piezoelectric materials. The solutions are derived based on the Stroh formalism. Three crack models studied here are the electrically impermeable, permeable and conducting cracks. The Green functions, the intensity factors of fields and the energy release rate are presented for the three cases. Numerical calculations have also performed to investigate the effect of the dipole’s rotation on the energy release rate at the crack tip. It is shown that the energy release rates for the three crack models all reach their maximum values when the direction of the dipole is perpendicular to the crack. Moreover, the energy release rate for an electrically conducting crack is greater than that for an electrically impermeable or permeable crack having the same size under the same loading conditions.     

An edge-based smoothed XFEM for fracture in composite materials

In this work, an edge-based smoothed extended finite element method (ES-XFEM) is extended to fracture analysis in composite materials. This method, in which the edge-based smoothing technique is married with enrichment in XFEM, shows advantages of both the extended finite element method (XFEM) and the edge-based smoothed finite element method (ES-FEM). The crack tip enrichment functions are specially derived to represent the characteristic of the displacement field around the crack tip in composite materials. Due to the strain smoothing, the necessity of integrating the singular derivatives of the crack tip enrichment functions is eliminated by transforming area integration into path integration, which is an obvious advantage compared with XFEM. Two examples are presented to testify the accuracy and convergence rate of the ES-XFEM.     

The scattering of harmonic elastic anti-plane shear waves by a Griffith crack in a piezoelectric material plane by using the non-local theory

In this paper, the dynamic behavior of a Griffith crack in a piezoelectric material plane under anti-plane shear waves is investigated by using the non-local theory for impermeable crack face conditions. For overcoming the mathematical difficulties, a one-dimensional non-local kernel is used instead of a two-dimensional one for the anti-plane dynamic problem to obtain the stress and the electric displacement near the crack tips. By using the Fourier transform, the problem can be solved with the help of two pairs of dual integral equations. These equations are solved using the Schmidt method. Contrary to the classical elasticity solution, it is found that no stress and electric displacement singularity is present near the crack tip. The non-local dynamic elastic solutions yield a finite hoop stress near the crack tip, thus allowing for a fracture criterion based on the maximum dynamic stress hypothesis. The finite hoop stress at the crack tip depends on the crack length, the circular frequency of incident wave and the lattice parameter. For comparison results between the non-local theory and the local theory for this problem, the same problem in the piezoelectric materials is also solved by using local theory.     

Numerical method for nonlinear models of penny-shaped cracks in three-dimensional magnetoelectroelastic media

Green functions corresponding to uniformly distributed extended displacement discontinuities on an annular crack element in the isotropic plane of a three-dimensional transversely isotropic magnetoelectroelastic medium are derived. Using the obtained Green functions, an extended displacement discontinuity method is presented to analyze a penny-shaped crack under axisymmetric loadings. Using the electric and magnetic polarization saturation model and the electric and magnetic breakdown model, the electric and magnetic yielding zones, the extended displacement discontinuities, the extended stress intensity factors and the J-integral are numerically calculated. The accuracy and efficiency of the proposed method are demonstrated by comparing the numerical results with those obtained from analytical solutions.     

Towards the computation of electrically permeable cracks in piezoelectrics

The focus of this paper is not the well-known and examined behavior of electrically impermeable and fully permeable cracks but the analysis of limited permeable cracks, i.e. the influence of a dielectric medium inside the crack. The boundary conditions of the impermeable or the fully permeable crack can be considered as simple approximations representing upper and lower bounds for the electrical energy penetrating the crack. In this paper, the accuracy of a known theoretical approach “capacitor analogy” for analyzing limited permeable cracks in piezoelectric ceramics is verified by means of numerical methods and analytical estimations. Different crack configurations in 2D and 3D are analyzed. The cracks are subjected to combined electrical and mechanical loads, which lead to a mixed Mode loading in Mode-I and Mode-IV. The influence of errors committed by the capacitor analogy approaching the crack tip is investigated using piezoelectric crack weight functions and special finite element techniques meshing the medium inside the crack. The numerical results of stress intensity factors, obtained by the crack tip element method which is valid for loaded crack faces, are presented. Finally, the theory is applied to the evaluation of a fracture experiment with a DCB specimen.     

On contact zone models for an electrically limited permeable interface crack in a piezoelectric bimaterial

An electrically limited permeable crack with a frictionless contact zone at the right crack tip between two semi-infinite piezoelectric spaces under the action of a remote electromechanical loading is considered. Attention is focused on the influence induced from the permittivity of the medium inside the crack gap on the contact zone length and the fracture mechanical parameters. Assuming the electric displacement constant inside the open region of the crack, the problem is reduced to a combined Dirichlet-Riemann and Hilbert boundary value problems which have been solved exactly. Stress and electric displacement intensity factors as well as the crack tip energy release rate are found in a clear analytical form. Furthermore, transcendental equations for the determination of the real contact zone length have been obtained for a general case and for a small contact zone length in an especially simple form. The dependencies of the mentioned values on the intensities of the electromechanical loading are presented in tables and associated diagrams.     

The influence of Maxwell stresses on the fracture mechanics of piezoelectric materials

The influence of Maxwell stresses on the generalized 2D fracture mechanics problem of piezoelectric materials under combined mechanical and electric loads at infinity is studied. The electrically semi-permeable crack boundary condition is adopted in this paper. Based on the Stroh’s formalism, explicit and closed-form solutions of electric displacement inside the crack, stress and electric intensity factors are obtained. Numerical results are also given to discuss the effects of Maxwell stresses on the stress and electric displacement intensity factors when the interior of the crack and the surrounding space at infinity are filled with different dielectric medium. It is found that the stress intensity factor increases rapidly with increasing value of the applied electric displacement load for the case of the dielectric constant of the surrounding at infinity is smaller than that inside the crack. The electric displacement intensity factor always increases as the applied electric loads or the applied mechanical loads increase.     

Application of the concepts of fracture mechanics to the failure of conductive cracks in piezoelectric ceramics

In the present paper, we report the success of applying the concepts of fracture mechanics to the failure of electrically conductive cracks in piezoelectric ceramics. We reexamine the charge-free zone model and the experimental results on poled lead zirconate titanate ceramics. We use the secant piezoelectric constant to describe the piezoelectric behavior at high electric field near a conductive crack tip. With this modification, the charge-free zone model provides more physical insight into the failure behavior of electrically conductive cracks in piezoelectric ceramics.     

XFEM fracture analysis of shells: The effect of crack tip enrichments

In this study the effect of crack tip enrichment functions in the extended finite element analysis of shells is investigated. Utilization of crack tip enrichments leads to reduction of the required number of elements, mesh independency and increased accuracy in computation of fracture mechanics parameters such as the stress intensity factor, the crack tip opening displacement and the crack tip opening angle. The procedure is verified by modeling various shell and plate problems and available benchmark tests. Also, effects of enrichments of in-plane, out-of-plane and rotational degrees of freedom and high order out-of-plane enrichments on different fracture modes are studied. Moreover, reduction of the dependency of crack tip opening angle on the element size in crack propagation problems is discussed.     

Hybrid extended displacement discontinuity-charge simulation method for analysis of cracks in 2D piezoelectric media

The extended displacement discontinuity method (EDDM) and the charge simulation method (CSM) are combined to develop an efficient approach for analysis of cracks in two-dimensional piezoelectric media. In the proposed hybrid EDD–CSM, the solution for an electrically impermeable crack is approximately expressed by a linear combination of fundamental solutions of the governing equations, which includes the extended point force fundamental solutions with the sources placed at chosen points outside the domain of the problem under consideration and the extended Crouch fundamental solutions with the extended displacement discontinuities placed on the crack. The coefficients of the fundamental solutions are determined by letting the approximated solution satisfy the conditions on the boundary of the domain and on the crack face. Furthermore, the hybrid EDD–CSM is applied to solve the problems of cracks under electrically permeable condition, as well as under semi-permeable conditions by using an iterative approach. Two important crack problems in fracture mechanics, the center cracks and the edge cracks in piezoelectric strips, are analyzed by the proposed method. The stress intensity factor and the electric displacement intensity factor are calculated. Meanwhile the effects of strip size and the electric boundary conditions on these intensity factors are studied.     

The fracture behavior of functionally graded piezoelectric materials with dielectric cracks

This article provides a comprehensive investigation on the fracture behavior of cracked functionally graded piezoelectric materials (FGPMs). To account for the effect of dielectric medium inside the crack upon the fracture behavior of FGPMs, a dielectric crack model is used in this work, in which the electric boundary condition along crack surfaces is deformation-dependent and is nonlinear. The analytical formulations are developed using Fourier transform technique and solving the nonlinear singular equations using Chebyshev polynomials. A solution technique is developed to determine the desired deformation mode of the crack. Numerical simulations are given to show the effects of material gradient and the dielectric medium filling the crack upon the fracture behavior of FGPMs. The results obtained from this dielectric crack model clearly demonstrate how the transition between electrically impermeable and permeable crack models occurs with the change of crack opening displacement in response to the applied electromechanical loads. It is also observed that a critical state for the applied electromechanical loading exists for FGPMs that determines whether the impermeable (or permeable) crack model serves as the upper or lower bound for the dielectric crack model considering the effect of dielectric medium filling the crack.     

On contact zone models for an electrically impermeable interface crack in a piezoelectric bimaterial

An electrically impermeable interface crack between two semi-infinite piezoelectric planes under remote mechanical tension-shear and electrical loading is studied. Assuming the stresses, strains and displacements are independent on the coordinate x ₂ the expressions for the elastic displacement and potential jumps as well as for the stresses and electrical displacement along the interface via a sectionally holomorphic vector function are found. Introducing an artificial contact zone at the right crack tip and assuming the materials possess the symmetry class 6 mm the problem is reduced for a wide range of bimaterial compounds to a combination of combined Dirichlet–Riemann and Hilbert boundary value problems which are solved analytically. From these solutions clear analytical expressions for characteristic mechanical and electrical parameters are derived. As particular cases of the above mentioned solution the classical (oscillating) and contact zone solutions are obtained. Further, a comparison with an associated solution for an electrically permeable crack has been performed. The fracture mechanical parameters for all models via the remote loads are found analytically and important relationships between these parameters are obtained. Due to these relationships an important algorithm of a numerical method applicable for the investigation of an interface crack in a finite sized piezoelectric bimaterial is suggested.     

含裂纹压电材料的Cell-Based光滑扩展有限元法

为精确而有效地求解机电耦合作用下含裂纹压电材料的断裂参数,首先,通过将复势函数法、扩展有限元法和光滑梯度技术引入到含裂纹压电材料的断裂机理问题中,提出了含裂纹压电材料的Cell-Based光滑扩展有限元法;然后,对含中心裂纹的压电材料强度因子进行了模拟,并将模拟结果与扩展有限元法和有限元法的计算结果进行了对比。数值算例结果表明:Cell-Based光滑扩展有限元法兼具扩展有限元法和光滑有限元法的特点,不仅单元网格与裂纹面相互独立,且裂尖处单元不需精密划分,与此同时,Cell-Based光滑扩展有限元法还具有形函数简单且不需求导、对网格质量要求低且求解精度高等优点。所得结论表明Cell-Based光滑扩展有限元法是压电材料断裂分析的有效数值方法。      

On the representation of solutions for the theory of generalized thermoelasticity with three phase-lags

An analytical investigation on the plastic zone size (PZS) of a crack near a circular inclusion has been carried out. Both the crack and the circular inclusion are embedded in an infinite matrix, with the crack oriented along the radial direction of the inclusion. In the solution procedure, the crack is simulated as a continuous distribution of edge dislocations. With the Dugdale model of small scale yielding, two stripe plastic zones at both crack tips are introduced. Using the solution of a circular inclusion interacting with a single dislocation as the Green’s function, the physical problem is formulated as a set of singular integral equations. With the aid of Erdogan and Gupta’s method and iterative numerical procedures, the singular integral equations are solved numerically for the PZS and the crack tip opening displacement. The results obtained in the current work can be reduced to those simpler cases of the Dugdale model.     

半空间中椭圆夹杂与裂纹对SH波的散射

采用Green函数、复变函数和多极坐标方法求解弹性半空间中椭圆形弹性夹杂与任意方位的裂纹对SH波的散射问题。利用“保角映射”技术求解椭圆夹杂对SH波的散射位移场,并构造适合本问题的Green函数,即含椭圆形弹性夹杂的弹性半空间内任意一点承受时间谐和的反平面荷载作用时的位移基本解,结合裂纹“切割”法构造裂纹,进而得到椭圆夹杂和裂纹同时存在条件下的位移场与应力场。最后,通过具体算例,讨论了不同参数对地表位移、弹性夹杂周边动应力集中系数和裂纹尖端动应力强度因子的影响规律。