Evaluating mixed-mode stress intensity factors from full-field displacement fields obtained by optical methods

A method for evaluating mode I, mode II and mixed-mode stress intensity factors from in-plane displacement fields using the method of nonlinear least-squares is proposed in this paper. Along with stress intensity factors, crack tip location and rigid body displacement components are determined simultaneously from both displacement components obtained using full-field optical methods or numerical methods. The effectiveness is validated by applying the proposed method to mixed-mode displacement fields obtained through digital image correlation, displacement fields obtained by analysis using elasto-plastic finite element method, and displacement fields around a fatigue crack obtained by electronic speckle pattern interferometry. Results show that the proposed method can extract stress intensity factors from the displacement fields both accurately and easily. Furthermore, they can be determined even if the material at a crack tip exhibits small-scale yielding. It is expected that the proposed method is applicable to various fracture problems during experimental and numerical evaluation of structural components.     

FEM for evaluation of weight functions for SIF, COD and higher-order coefficients with application to a typical wedge splitting specimen

In the evaluation of accurate weight functions for the coefficients of first few terms of the linear elastic crack tip fields and the crack opening displacement (COD) using the finite element method (FEM), singularities at the crack tip and the loading point need to be properly considered. The crack tip singularity can be well captured by a hybrid crack element (HCE), which directly predicts accurate coefficients of first few terms of the linear elastic crack tip fields. A penalty function technique is introduced to handle the point load. With the use of these methods numerical results of a typical wedge splitting (WS) specimen subjected to wedge forces at arbitrary locations on the crack faces are obtained. With the help of appropriate interpolation techniques, these results can be used as weight functions. The range of validity of the so-called Paris equation, which is widely used in the evaluation of the COD from the stress intensity factors (SIFs), is established.     

Numerical analysis of dynamic T stress of moving interfacial crack

A method to extract dynamic T stress term of moving interfacial crack is proposed. Anisotropic bimaterial which has subsonic crack propagation is considered, and interaction energy method is applied. Stress fields by the constant T stress and stress fields by the point force moving with the crack are obtained by using the series expansion method and Stroh formalism. J based interaction energy (J^I) between the constant T stress and the point force is calculated by Yeh formulation and the relation between interaction energy and T stress is obtained. Energy release rate and T stress of a moving interfacial crack are calculated numerically. Elastodynamic finite element code is developed to investigate fracture parameters for the propagating crack. Four nodes linear elastodynamic element is used and Newmark formulae are applied to integrate displacement and velocity. Node release method is adapted to simulate crack propagation along the interface. The energy release rate is calculated in the area moving with crack. T stress term is calculated from the interaction energy with a stress field formed by the moving point force. Five examples are solved to show the validity and time history of energy release rate and T stress. The energy release rate calculated from numerical analysis agrees well with an analytic solution and experimental results. The T stress of homogeneous specimen under the steady state condition shows a slightly different value compared with the stationary result. It is observed that the T stress of polymethyl methacrylate–steel specimen shows continuous change and the T stress of aluminum-polymethyl methacrylate specimen shows discontinuous jump when the initial crack initiates. From the result of the variation of T stress, the effect of T stress on the stability of crack propagation is observed.     

用切口尖端单元分析各向异性材料中多边形孔奇异性应力场

该文提出了一种基于全数值方法的新型杂交元方法, 用于研究各向异性复合材料中多边形孔奇异性应力场干涉问题。该方法的建立分3 个步骤:首先, 用一维有限元方法求解各向异性材料切口尖端奇异性应力场数值特征解;然后, 采用杂交有限元列式构造一种超级切口尖端单元, 其中, 假设应力场和位移场是利用上述奇异性场数值特征解推导出来的;最后, 将上述超级切口尖端单元与传统4 结点杂交应力元组装, 得到新型杂交元方法。算例中, 将裂纹问题作为考核例, 并进一步考察双菱形孔和双矩形孔的奇异性应力干涉问题。算例表明:当前模型能降低单元数, 且精度好;与传统有限元法和积分方程方法相比, 该模型更具有通用性和高效性, 为各向异性材料的细观力学分析打下了基础。     

Transient dynamic analysis of interface cracks in layered anisotropic solids under impact loading

Transient elastodynamic crack analysis in two-dimensional (2D), layered, anisotropic and linear elastic solids is presented in this paper. A time-domain boundary element method (BEM) in conjunction with a multi-domain technique is developed for this purpose. Time-domain elastodynamic fundamental solutions for homogenous, anisotropic and linear elastic solids are applied in the present time-domain BEM. The spatial discretization of the boundary integral equations is performed by a Galerkin-method, while a collocation method is adopted for the temporal discretization of the arising convolution integrals. An explicit time-stepping scheme is developed to compute the unknown boundary data and the crack-opening-displacements (CODs). To show the effects of the crack configuration, the material anisotropy, the layer combination and the dynamic loading on the dynamic stress intensity factors and the scattered elastic wave fields, several numerical examples are presented and discussed.     

Numerical analysis of blunting of a crack tip in a ductile material under small-scale yielding and mixed mode loading

The blunting of the tip of a crack in a ductile material is analysed under the conditions of plane strain, small-scale yielding, and mixed mode loading of Modes I and II. The material is assumed to be an elastic-perfectly plastic solid with Poisson's ratio being 1/2. The stress and strain fields for a sharp crack under mixed mode loading are first determined by means of elastic-plastic finite element analysis. It is shown that only one elastic sector exists around the crack tip, in contrast with the possibility of existence of two elastic sectors as discussed by Gao. The results obtained for a sharp crack are used as the boundary conditions for the subsequent numerical analysis of crack tip blunting under mixed mode loading, based on slip line theory. The characteristic shapes of the blunted crack tip are obtained for a wide range of Mode I and Mode II combinations, and found to resemble the tip of Japanese sword. Also the stress field around the blunted crack tip is determined.     

Automated simulation of fatigue crack propagation for two-dimensional linear elastic fracture mechanics problems by boundary element method

In this paper, automated simulation of multiple crack fatigue propagation for two-dimensional (2D) linear elastic fracture mechanics (LEFM) problems is developed by using boundary element method (BEM). The boundary element method is the displacement discontinuity method with crack-tip elements proposed by the author. Because of an intrinsic feature of the boundary element method, a general growth problem of multiple cracks can be solved in a single-region formulation. In the numerical simulation, for each increment of crack extension, remeshing of existing boundaries is not necessary. Local discretization on the incremental crack extension is performed easily. Further the new adding elements and the existing elements on the existing boundaries are employed to construct easily the total structural mesh representation. Here, the mixed-mode stress intensity factors are calculated by using the formulas based on the displacement fields around crack tip. The maximum circumferential stress theory is used to predict crack stability and direction of propagation at each step. The well-known Paris’ equation is extended to multiple crack case under mixed-mode loadings. Also, the user does not need to provide a desired crack length increment at the beginning of each simulation. The numerical examples are included to illustrate the validation of the numerical approach for fatigue growth simulation of multiple cracks for 2D LEFM problems.     

Identification of damage and cracking behaviours based on energy dissipation mode analysis in a quasi-brittle material using digital image correlation

Characterizing the crack stability to predict the behaviour of ceramics designed for industrial use is a challenging issue. It requires accurate crack tip detection during the controlled crack propagation of notched bending tests. Different indirect methods are available, like for instance the compliance technique. Recently, techniques based on digital image correlation (DIC) have emerged: finite-element DIC (FE-DIC) with a finite element decomposition of the displacement field, integrated-DIC (I-DIC) based on Williams?? series decomposition of the displacement field and regularized-DIC (R-DIC) for mechanical constraints. These full-field techniques enable the quantification of the crack length and the stress intensity factor K ^I . In this paper, these four methods are compared in terms of measurements of crack lengths and stress intensity factors during a notched bending test. The tested material is a damageable quasi-brittle ceramic at room temperature. The non linearity of the stress-strain law of this microcraked ceramic results in a complex behaviour that is not captured by the compliance method during the bending test. Therefore the linear elastic compliance method leads to a different estimation of crack lengths and stress intensity factors compared to DIC methods. On the other hand, the R-DIC approach handles the non linear material constitutive behaviour. It allows a deeper analysis of the mechanical fields, the energy dissipation and the damage mechanisms during the crack propagation.     

Analytical forms of higher-order asymptotic elastic-plastic crack-tip fields in a linear hardening material under antiplane shear

An analytical study of the higher-order asymptotic solutions of the stress and strain fields near the traction-free crack tip under antiplane shear in a linear hardening material is investigated. The results show that every term of the asymptotic fields is controlled by both elasticity and plasticity and all the higher-order asymptotic fields are governed by linear nonhomogeneous equations. The first four term solutions are presented analytically and the first four terms are described by two independent parameters J and K ₂. The amplitude of the second order term solution is only dependent on the material properties, but independent of loading and geometry. This paper focuses on the case with traction-free crack surface boundary conditions. The effects of different crack surface boundary conditions, such as clamped and mixed surfaces, on the crack-tip fields are also presented. Comparison of multi-term solution with leading term solution, and finite element solution in an infinite strip with semi-infinite crack under constant displacements along the edges is provided.     

Complete theoretical analysis for higher order asymptotic terms and the HRR zone at a crack tip for Mode I and Mode II loading of a hardening material

Summary A complete development for the first two terms of the crack tip fields for both Mode I and Mode II loading of a hardening material in either plane stress or plane strain is performed, including the elastic deformation in the analysis. It is shown that the determination of the order of the second term depends on bothn and whether plane stress or plane strain is considered. In addition, regions of HRR dominance at a crack tip for the field variables are estimated. Comparison of the analytic predictions with finite element results indicates that the analytic results for the zone of HRR dominance are in agreement with numerical predictions.     

Antiplane crack analysis of a functionally graded material by a BIEM

Elastostatic analysis of an antiplane crack in a functionally graded material (FGM) is performed by using a hypersingular boundary integral equation method (BIEM). An exponential law is applied to describe the spatial variation of the shear modulus of the FGM. A Galerkin method is applied for the numerical solution of the hypersingular traction BIE. Both unidirectional and bidirectional material gradations are investigated. Stress intensity factors for an infinite and linear elastic FGM containing a finite crack subjected to an antiplane crack-face loading are presented and discussed. The influences of the material gradients and the crack orientation on the stress intensity factors are analyzed.     

An analysis of cracks emanating from a circular hole in unidirectional fiber-reinforced composites

This paper presents an analytical study of cracks emanating from a circular hole in an off-axis unidirectional fiber-reinforced composite. A convenient and accurate method of analysis is formulated on the basis of conservation laws of elasticity and of fundamental relationships in anisotropic fracture mechanics. The problem is eventually reduced to a system of linear algebraic equations in mixedmode stress intensity factors. Superiority of the current analysis to other approaches in investigating the problem with very complicated crack geometry and material anisotropy is demonstrated when used in conjunction with any numerical method such as a finite element analysis. Mixed-mode stress intensity factors and the associated energy release rates in the crack problem are determined for the composites with various fiber orientations. Solutions for both single and double cracks emanating from the edge of a hole in the composites are presented also to illustrate the fundamental nature of the problem.     

Singular stress analysis of an anisotropic elastic medium containing polygonal holes using a novel hybrid finite element method

A novel hybrid finite element method based on a numerical procedure is proposed to compute singular field near V-shaped notch corners in an anisotropic material containing polygonal holes. The finite element method is established by the following three steps: (1) an ad hoc one-dimensional finite element formulation is employed to determined numerical eigensolutions of the singular field near an V-shaped notch corner; (2) a super corner tip element is constructed to determine the strength of the singular field, in which the independent assumed stress fields are extracted from the eigensolutions; (3) a novel hybrid finite element equation is obtained by coupling the super corner tip element with the conventional hybrid stress elements. In numerical examples, generalized stress intensity factors for interactions between two polygonal holes with various geometry, space position and material property are mainly discussed. All the numerical results show that present method yields satisfactory singular stress field solutions with fewer elements. Compared with the conventional finite element methods and integral equation methods, the present method is more suitable for dealing with micromechanics of anisotropic materials.     

A finite element stress analysis of a crack in a bi-material plate

A stress analysis is presented for the problem of a crack in one material of a bi-material plate located perpendicular to the material interface. A numerical solution using the finite element techniques to determine the force displacement relationships is used. Knowing this, a work integral method is used to determine the stress intensity factors for the crack. Since the work integral is independent of path, the path of integration can be chosen far enough away from the crack tip to avoid the complications of the crack tip singularity. The problem is studied for a number of cases where the crack length to plate width ratio, distance from crack tip to material interface, and the ratio of material constants were varied as parameters.     

On the evaluation of the J-integral by a plastic crack tip element

Two crack tip elements are formulated for a stationary, mode I plastic crack in planar structures using hybrid assumed stress approach, based on the secant modulus and the Newton-Raphson schemes, respectively. The stress distribution in the crack tip element is assumed to be the HRR field superimposed by the regular polynomial terms. The formulated (hybrid) crack tip elements are compatible with the isoparametric element so that they can be used conveniently along with the conventional displacement-based finite elements. The intensity of the HRR stress field, the J-integral, is determined directly from the finite element equations together with the nodal displacements. The dominance of the HRR stress field at the crack tip is pertinent to the present approach, which depends on geometry and loading conditions. Since the J-integral is globally path-independent for nonlinear elastic materials (deformation plasticity model), in order to assess the accuracy and efficiency of the methodology as compared to the contour integration approach, numerical studies of common plane-stress cracked configurations are performed for these materials. The results indicate that for a sufficiently small crack tip element size, J from the present approach correlates well, within 6 percent difference, with that from the contour integration for a wide range of material hardening coefficients if the HRR zone exists at the crack tip. These highly accurate results for J from the crack tip stresses could not be achieved without using (newly) modified variational principles and a refined numerical technique. It should be emphasized that the present methodology also can be applied to cracks in J ₂ flow materials under HRR dominance. In such case, the J integral may not be globally path independent, and hence it now must be determined from the stress and strain fields near the crack tip.     

Surface effects on the near-tip stress fields of a mode-II crack

On the physical nature, most crack tips are not ideally sharp but have a small curvature radius. Both surface energy and crack-root curvature affect the stress and displacement fields in the vicinity of the crack tip. In the present paper, a numerical method, which incorporates the effect of surface elasticity into the finite element method, is employed to study the surface effects on the mode-II crack tip fields. It is found that when the curvature radius of the crack root decreases to micro-/nanometers, surface elasticity has a significant influence on the stresses near the crack tip. For a mode-II crack, surface effects alter both the magnitude and position of the maximum stresses, as is different from a mode-I crack, in which case only the stress magnitude is influence by surface stresses.     

Determination of stress intensity factors in cracked plates by the finite element method

Stress fields near crack tips in an elastic body can be specified by the stress intensity factors which are closely related to the stress singularities arising from the crack tips. These singularities, however, cannot be represented exactly by conventional finite element models. A new method for the analysis of stresses around cracks is proposed in this paper on the basis of the superposition of analytical and finite element solutions. This method is applied to several two-dimensional problems whose solutions are obtained analytically, and it is shown that their numerical results are in excellent agreement with analytical ones. Sufficiently accurate results can be obtained by the conventional finite element analysis with rather coarse mesh subdivision. Computational efforts are then considerably reduced compared with other methods.     

Analysis of dynamic interaction between an inclusion and a nearby moving crack by BEM

In this paper, the dynamic interaction between an inclusion and a nearby moving crack embedded in an elastic medium is studied by the boundary element method (BEM). To deal with this problem, the multi-region technique and two kinds of time-domain boundary integral equations (BIEs) are introduced. The system is divided into two parts along the interface between the inclusion and the matrix medium. Each part is linear, elastic, homogeneous and isotropic. The non-hypersingular traction boundary integral equation is applied on the crack surfaces; while the traditional displacement boundary integral equation is used on the interface and external boundaries. In the numerical solution procedure, square root shape functions are adopted as to describe the proper asymptotic behavior in the vicinity of the crack-tips. The crack growth is modeled by adding new elements of constant length to the moving crack tip, which is controlled by the fracture criterion based on the maximum circumferential stress. In each time step, the direction and the speed of the crack advance are evaluated. The numerical results of the crack growth path, speed, dynamic stress intensity factors (DSIFs) and dynamic interface tractions for various material combinations and geometries are presented. The effect of the inclusion on the moving crack is discussed.     

Advantages of the J-integral approach for calculating stress intensity factors when using the commercial finite element software ABAQUS

A predictive method for remaining component lifetime evaluation consists in integrating the crack growth law of the material considered in a finite element step-by-step process. So, as part of a linear elastic fracture mechanics analysis, the determination of the stress intensity factor distribution is a crucial point. The aim of the present work is to test several existing numerical techniques reported in the literature. Both the crack opening displacement extrapolation method and the J-integral approach are applied in 2D and 3D ABAQUS finite element models. The results obtained by these various means on CT specimens and cracked round bars are in good agreement with those found in the literature. Nevertheless, since the knowledge of the field near the crack tip is not required in the energetic method, the J-integral calculations seem to be a good technique to deal with the fatigue growth of general cracks.     

Predicting fatigue crack growth rate in a welded butt joint: The role of effective R ratio in accounting for residual stress effect

A simple and efficient method is presented in this paper for predicting fatigue crack growth rate in welded butt joints. Three well-known empirical crack growth laws are employed using the material constants that were obtained from the base material coupon tests. Based on the superposition rule of the linear elastic fracture mechanics, welding residual stress effect is accounted for by replacing the nominal stress ratio (R) in the empirical laws by the effective stress intensity factor ratio (R_eff). The key part of the analysis process is to calculate the stress intensity factor due to the initial residual stress field and also the stress relaxation and redistribution due to crack growth. The finite element method in conjunction with the modified virtual crack closure technique was used for this analysis. Fatigue crack growth rates were then calculated by the empirical laws and comparisons were made among these predictions as well as against published experimental tests, which were conducted under either constant amplitude load or constant stress intensity factor range. Test samples were M(T) geometry made of aluminium alloy 2024-T351 with a longitudinal weld by the variable polarity plasma arc welding process. Good agreement was achieved.