Crack kinking under nonsymmetric loading

This paper considers an asymmetrically kinked, semi-infinite crack in a two-dimensional solid under mixed-mode loading and a stress acting parallel to the main crack, the latter providing the non-singular stress term, T, in the Irwin-Williams expansion of the crack tip field. The aim of the study is twofold: First, to obtain an almost closed-form solution for the stress intensity factors at the tip of the kink with a view to explaining a curious result observed by many authors that under predominantly Mode I loading the first order solution in small kink angle is accurate for considerably large kink angles and, second, to study the effect of the in-plane tensile stress on the stability of crack growth. Where possible, the results are compared with those available in the literature.