Cracks emanating from a rhombus hole in infinite and finite plate subjected to internal pressure

This note deals with the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of cracks emanating from a rhombus hole in a rectangular plate subjected to internal pressure by means of the displacement discontinuity method with crack-tip elements (a boundary element method) proposed recently by the author. Moreover, an empirical formula of the SIFs of the crack problem is presented and examined. It is found that the empirical formula is very accurate for evaluating the SIFs of the crack problem.     

Dynamic analysis of interfacial crack problems in anisotropic bi-materials by a time-domain BEM

A time-domain boundary element method (BEM) together with the sub-domain technique is applied to study dynamic interfacial crack problems in two-dimensional (2D), piecewise homogeneous, anisotropic and linear elastic bi-materials. The bi-material system is divided into two homogeneous sub-domains along the interface and the traditional displacement boundary integral equations (BIEs) are applied on the boundary of each sub-domain. The present time-domain BEM uses a quadrature formula for the temporal discretization to approximate the convolution integrals and a collocation method for the spatial discretization. Quadratic quarter-point elements are implemented at the tips of the interface cracks. A displacement extrapolation technique is used to determine the complex dynamic stress intensity factors (SIFs). Numerical examples for computing the complex dynamic SIFs are presented and discussed to demonstrate the accuracy and the efficiency of the present time-domain BEM.     

Cracks emanating from a square hole in rectangular plate in tension

A numerical analysis of cracks emanating from a square hole in a rectangular plate in tension is performed using a hybrid displacement discontinuity method (a boundary element method). Detailed solutions of the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of the plane elastic crack problem are given, which can reveal the effect of geometric parameters of the cracked body on the SIFs. By comparing the calculated SIFs of the plane elastic crack problem with those of the centre crack in a rectangular plate in tension, in addition, an amplifying effect of the square hole on the SIFs is found. The numerical results reported here also prove that the boundary element method is simple, yet accurate, for calculating the SIFs of complex crack problems in finite plate.     

Evaluating stress intensity factors of a surface crack in lubricated rolling contacts

The three-dimensional finite element method and the least-squares method were used to find the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of a surface crack in a lubricated roller. A steel roller on a rigid plane was modeled, in which a semi-elliptical surface crack is inclined at an angle ψ to the vertical axis. A distance c is set between the crack base and the roller edge. The results indicate that the mode-I SIF reaches the maximum value when the angle θ is equal to 0° (on the roller surface), and the mode-II SIF reaches the absolute maximum value when the angle θ is near or equal to 90° (inside the roller), where θ is the angle of the semi-ellipse from 0° to 180°. The influence of mode-III SIFs in this model is minor since they are much smaller than the mode-I and mode-II SIFs. The SIFs increase greatly when the crack location approaches the uncrowned edge. At this time, a crowned profile can be used to significantly reduce the SIFs near the roller edge. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Stress intensity factors for cracks emanating from a circular hole in an infinite quasi‐orthotropic plane

An infinite quasi‐orthotropic plane with a cracked circular hole under tensile loading at infinity is studied analytically. To this end, complex variable theory of Muskhelishvili is used. In addition, to obtain analytical functions, a new conformal mapping is proposed and expanded to series expressions. Stress intensity factors (SIFs) for two unequal cracks emanating from a circular hole are obtained. To validate the analytical SIFs in a quasi‐orthotropic plane, the results are compared with FEM and the results of isotropic plane. The SIFs for small cracks in a quasi‐orthotropic and an isotropic plane are different, because of difference between stress concentrations in points which cracks emanate from the hole. However, the results of quasi‐orthotropic plane converge to isotropic plane for the large cracks. Therefore, the SIFs of the large cracks in a quasi‐orthotropic plane can be replaced by the results of the center crack with equivalent length in an isotropic plane.     

A lamellar inhomogeneity near a multiphase reinforcement

In composites, the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of a lamellar inhomogeneity near a multiphase reinforcement are of interest. Based on extension of Eshelby’s equivalent inclusion method, a unified approach is presented to study the effect of a multiphase inhomogeneity on the SIF at the tip points of two- and three-dimensional lamellar inhomogeneities under nonuniform far-field loadings. Alteration of the SIF due to the presence of a coating layer around the inhomogeneity is addressed. Furthermore, the effect of geometry and stiffness of each phase of a multiphase reinforcement on the mixed mode SIFs of a lamellar inhomogeneity is investigated. In contrast to cracks whose SIFs are the same for uniaxial and multiaxial far-field loadings, all axial far-field applied stresses, which are parallel or perpendicular to the anticrack plane, result in the square root stress singularity at the anticrack tip points. However, only those components of the far-field shear stress whose couple vector is perpendicular to the anticrack plane would generate nonvanishing mixed mode SIFs, whereas for the shear components with couple vectors parallel to the anticrack plane, the SIF vanishes.     

Stress intensity factor analysis of a three-dimensional interface crack between dissimilar anisotropic materials

A new numerical method to calculate the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of a three-dimensional interface crack between dissimilar anisotropic materials was developed. In this study, the M-integral method was employed for mode separation of the SIFs. The moving least-square method was utilized to calculate the M-integral. Using the M-integral with the moving least-square method, SIFs can be automatically calculated with only the nodal displacements from the finite element method (FEM). Here, SIFs analyses of some typical three-dimensional problems are demonstrated. Excellent agreement was achieved between the numerical results obtained by the present method and the corresponding results proposed by other researchers. In addition, the SIFs of a single-edge crack, a through crack, and a semi-circular crack between two anisotropic solids in three-dimensional structures were analyzed.     

Interaction between an electrically permeable crack and the imperfect interface in a functionally graded piezoelectric sensor

For a cracked piezoelectric sensor with an imperfect interface, the interaction between the crack and the imperfect interface is a problem of practical significance. Such a problem is investigated by the method of singular integral equation in the present work. The interface is assumed to be mechanically compliant and weakly conducting. Parametric studies on stress intensity factors (SIFs) indicate that when the crack is near to the interface SIFs increase as the interface change from perfection to imperfection, and the mechanical imperfection generally has more remarkable influence on SIFs than the dielectric imperfection does. For a crack in the piezoelectric layer and near to the interface, the SIF gets less sensitive to the variation of the substrate thickness if the interface becomes imperfect. The interfacial imperfection has less influence on the fracture behavior of a stiffer piezoelectric layer.     

Accuracy and limit of a least-squares method to calculate 3D notch SIFs

To evaluate the three-dimensional (3D) stress intensity factors (SIFs) of a sharp V-notch using the finite element result is limited in the literature. Thus, this study developed a least-squares method to solve this problem as well as study its restriction and accuracy. First, the William’s eigenfunction and complex stress function approach are deduced into a least-squares form, and then stress field from the finite element analysis is substituted into the least-squares equation to evaluate the 3D SIFs. Numerical simulations in this article show that the least-squares method can be used to calculate SIFs accurately if more than two stress terms are included. The calculated SIFs of this least-squares method are not sensitive to the maximum and minimum radiuses of the area from which data are included. The major advantage of the proposed method is that the procedure is simple and systematic, so it can be applied to any finite element code without difficulties.     

The cyclically symmetric anti-plane fracture analysis for the arc-shaped interface in a non-homogeneous bimaterial cylindrical structure

A hollow cylinder, which consists of an inner functionally graded elastic substrate and an outer functionally graded elastic layer with cyclically symmetric cracks (a special case of multiple cracks), is considered under anti-plane shear load. The method of variable separation is employed to reduce the mixed boundary value problems to a Cauchy singular integral equation, which is solved numerically by the Lobatto–Chebyshev quadrature technique. Numerical results are presented to show the effects of geometrical and physical quantities on the stress intensity factors (SIFs). Parametric studies are conducted on the SIFs, and practical guidelines are given for the optimization of the fracture performance: (a) the SIFs depend on the ratio between the outer and inner radii, and the ratio should be at least 1.1; (b) the outer elastic layer should be stiffer than the inner elastic substrate; (c) large non-homogeneity parameter of the outer graded layer and small non-homogeneity parameter of the inner graded substrate are beneficial to SIFs reduction; (d) there is a strong interference between the stress fields around multiple cracks when the cyclically symmetric parameter increases.     

Cracks emanating from circular hole or square hole in rectangular plate in tension

A numerical analysis of cracks emanating from a circular hole (Fig. 1) or a square hole (Fig. 2) in rectangular plate in tension is performed by means of the displacement discontinuity method with crack-tip elements (a boundary element method) presented recently by the author. Detail solutions of the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of the two plane elastic crack problems are given, which can reveal the effect of geometric parameters of the cracked bodies on the SIFs. By comparing the SIFs of the two crack problems with those of the center crack in rectangular plate in tension (Fig. 3), in addition, an effect of the circular hole or the square hole on the SIFs of the center crack is discussed in detail. The numerical results reported here also illustrate that the boundary element method is simple, yet accurate for calculating the SIFs of complex crack problems in finite plate.     

Stress intensity factors evaluation for through-transverse crack in slab track system under vehicle dynamic load

The stress intensity factors (SIFs) for through-transverse crack in the China Railway Track System (CRTS II) slab track system under vehicle dynamic load are evaluated in this paper. A coupled dynamic model of a half-vehicle and the slab track is presented in which the half-vehicle is treated as a 18-degree-of-freedom multi-body system. The slab track is modeled as two continuous Bernoulli–Euler beams supported by a series of elastic rectangle plates on a viscoelastic foundation. The model is applied to calculate the vertical and lateral dynamic wheel–rail forces. A three-dimensional finite element model of the slab track system is then established in which the through-transverse crack at the bottom of concrete base is created by using extended finite element method (XFEM). The wheel–rail forces obtained by the vehicle-track dynamics calculation are utilized as the inputs to finite element model, and then the values of dynamic SIFs at the crack-tip are extracted from the XFEM solution by domain based interaction integral approach. The influences of subgrade modulus, crack length, crack angle, friction coefficient between cracked surfaces, and friction coefficient between faces of concrete base and subgrade on dynamic SIFs are investigated in detail. The analysis indicates that the subgrade modulus, crack length and crack angle have great effects on dynamic SIFs at the crack-tip, while both of the friction coefficients have negligible influences on variations of dynamic SIFs. Also the statistical characteristics of varying SIFs due to random wheel–rail forces are studied and results reveal that the distributions of dynamic SIFs follow an approximately Gaussian distribution with different mean values and standard deviations. The numerical results obtained are very useful in the maintenance of the slab track system.     

Stress intensity factors of cracks emanating from a surface square hole in infinite body in tension

This paper deals with such a kind of surface crack problem with a same depth (called a liked‐plane crack problem for short). Based on the previous investigations on an internal rectangular crack and a surface rectangular crack in an infinite solid in tension and the hybrid displacement discontinuity method, a numerical approach for the liked‐plane crack problem is presented. Numerical examples are given to illustrate the numerical approach is simple, yet accurate for calculating the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of the liked‐plane crack problem. Specifically, SIFs of a pair of cracks emanating from a surface square hole in an infinite body in tension are investigated in detail.     

新的估算表面裂纹应力强度因子经验公式

该文给出了新的估算拉伸和纯弯曲载荷下表面裂纹应力强度因子的经验公式。根据疲劳裂纹扩展的数值模拟结果确定强度因子分布函数;利用按已知应力强度因子分布函数求裂纹形状及相应应力强度因子的方法计算给定尺寸的表面裂纹的应力强度因子;通过对数值结果的曲线回归得到估算表面裂纹应力强度因子经验公式。利用该公式对有限厚度和宽度平板内表面裂纹的应力强度因子进行了估算,并与已知的半椭圆形表面裂纹的应力强度因子解进行了比较。该文结果为估算表面裂纹应力强度因子提供了一种新的途径。     

Rectangular tensile sheet with single edge crack or edge half-circular-hole crack

By using the displacement discontinuity method with crack-tip elements (a boundary element method) proposed recently by the author, this note presents the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of a rectangular tensile plate with single edge crack. Further this note studies the SIFs of crack emanating from an edge half-circular hole. By comparing the calculated SIFs of the single edge half-circular-hole crack with those of the single edge crack, a shielding effect of the half-circular hole on the SIFs of the single edge crack is discussed. It is found that the boundary element method is simple, yet accurate for calculating the SIFs of complex crack problems in finite plate.     

Weight Function for an Inclined Edge Crack in a Semiplane

The matrix-like structure of the Weight Function (WF) for determining the Stress Intensity Factors (SIFs) in a nonsymmetric plane body is obtained from the general properties of the elastic field. General asymptotic and symmetric properties of the WF are discussed. By extending a previously proposed methodology, an analytical approximate WF is determined for an edge crack in a semiplane within the range of inclination (-75^–75^). Finite Element evaluations considering the minimum number of loading conditions were performed to this purpose. The accuracy of the SIFs obtained by the WF is found in the order of a few tenths of percent. The solution of a typical problem illustrates the practical usefulness of the WF. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

A fracture mechanics problem of a functionally graded layered structure with an arbitrarily oriented crack crossing the interface

In this paper, the fracture mechanics problem for an arbitrarily oriented crack crossing the interface in a functionally graded layered structure is investigated. The elastic modulus is assumed to be continuous at the interface, but its derivative may be discontinuous. Applying the superposition principle and Fourier integral transform, the stress fields and displacement fields are derived. A group of auxiliary functions defined in both layers are introduced and then the mixed-mode crack problem is turned into solving a group of singular integral equations. The mixed-mode stress intensity factors (SIFs) are obtained by solving the singular integral equations. The influences of the material nonhomogeneity parameter, normalized crack length and crack angle on the SIFs are investigated. It is found that the mixed-mode SIFs can be affected greatly by the crack angle. Moreover, the mixed-mode SIFs usually attain their extremum when the crack tips get to the interface during one crack moves from one layer into another layer. The present work may form the basic work for establishing a multi-layered fracture mechanics model of FGMs with an arbitrarily oriented crack and general mechanical properties.     

Three-dimensional stress intensity factors of a central square crack in a transversely isotropic cuboid with arbitrary material orientations

In this paper, we present the dual boundary element method (dual-BEM) or single-domain BEM to analyze the mixed three-dimensional (3D) stress intensity factors (SIFs) in a finite and transversely isotropic solid containing an internal square crack. The planes of both the transverse isotropy and square crack can be oriented arbitrarily with respect to a fixed global coordinate system. A set of four special nine-node quadrilateral elements are utilized to approximate the crack front as well as the outer boundary, and the mixed 3D SIFs are evaluated using the asymptotic relation between the SIFs and the relative crack opening displacements (COD) via the Barnett–Lothe tensor.Numerical examples are presented for a cracked cuboid which is transversely isotropic with any given orientation and is under a uniform vertical traction on its top and bottom surfaces. The square crack is located in the center of the cuboid but is oriented arbitrarily. Our results show that among the selected material and crack orientations, the mode-I SIF reaches the largest possible value when the material inclined angle ψ₁=45° and dig angle β₁=45°, and the crack inclined angle ψ₂=0° and dig angle β₂=0°. It is further observed that when the crack is oriented vertically or nearly vertically, the mode-I SIF becomes negative, indicating that the crack closes due to an overall compressive loading normal to the crack surface. Variation of the SIFs for modes II and III along the crack fronts also shows some interesting features for different combinations of the material and crack orientations.     

Fracture behaviors for a functionally graded superconducting cylinder with a cylindrical crack

In this study, a double exponential model is proposed to investigate the cylindrical crack problem for a functionally graded superconducting cylinder. The stress intensity factors (SIFs) are analytically obtained by transforming the corresponding crack problem into dual integral equations. The effects of applied magnetic field, model parameters, and crack configuration on the SIFs are analyzed. Some important phenomena are observed. Among others, both decreasing the graded index of Young's modulus and increasing the introduced nondimensional exponent parameter in the critical current model can inhibit crack propagation. This study should be useful for the application of superconducting devices.     

Determination of stress intensity factors for multi-material junctions

This study evaluates the junction-tip coordinates and the stress intensity factors (SIFs) of multi-material junctions using the image-correlation experiment and least-squares method. The major advantage of the proposed method is that the procedure is simple and systematic. First, complex displacement functions are deduced into a least-squares form, and then displacement fields from the image-correlation experiment are substituted into the least-squares equation to evaluate the SIFs. Compared with the SIFs from H-integrals using finite element results, the calculated least-squares SIFs are accurate if more than 10 eigenvalues are included. Furthermore, the least-squares SIFs are not sensitive to the maximum or minimum radius of the area from which data is included.