The propensity of the transition of fracture type in either brittle or ductile cracked solid under mixed-mode I and III loading conditions is investigated. A fracture criterion based on the competition of the maximum normal stress and maximum shear stress is utilized. The prediction of the fracture type is determined by comparing smax=rmax at a critical distance from the crack tip to the materi...

in recent years, the application of composite materials in aircraft and space vehicle structural components has become increasingly popular. preventing failure of composite structural systems has been an important issue in engineering design. due to the lack of through-the-thickness reinforcement, structures made from laminated composite materials and adhesively bonded joints are highly suscept...

sudden fracture is one of the major failure modes in brittle materials. plexiglass (polymethyl methacrylate) is a well known brittle polymer, widely used in various industries. many types of notches, particularly v-shaped notches, are sometimes used in the components made of plexiglass. these notches can dramatically decrease the load bearing capacity of components due to the concentration of s...

Interlaminar fracture mechanics has proven useful for characterizing the onset of delaminations in composites and has been used with limited success primarily to investigate onset in fracture toughness specimens and laboratory size coupon type specimens. Future acceptance of the methodology by industry and certification authorities however, requires the successful demonstration of the methodolo...

The present paper deals with the mixed mode fracture analysis of a weakened orthotropic half-plane with multiple cracks propagation. The orthotropic half-plane contains Volterra type glide and climb edge dislocations. It is assumed that the medium is under in-plane loading conditions. The distributed dislocation technique is used to obtain integral equations for the dynamic problem of multiple ...

The cracked Brazilian disc (CBD) specimen is widely used in order to determine mode-I/II and mixed-mode fracture toughness of a rock medium. In this study, the stress intensity factor (SIF) on the crack-tip in this specimen is calculated for various geometrical crack conditions using the extended-finite element method (X-FEM). This method is based upon the finite element method (FEM). In this m...

The present paper discusses the results of an investigation into the effects of test rate and the mode of loading on the fracture energy, Gc, of adhesively-bonded fibre-composite joints. Various carbon-fibre reinforced-polymer (CFRP) matrix composite substrates have been bonded using two different types of automotive structural epoxy-adhesives. They have been tested via loading the bonded joint...

Rate effects for adhesively-bonded joints in steel sheets failing by mode-I fracture and plastic deformation were examined. Three types of test geometries were used to provide a range of crack velocities between 0.1 mm/s and 5000 mm/s: a DCB geometry under displacement control, a wedge geometry under displacement control, and a wedge geometry loaded under impact conditions. Two fracture modes w...

The method of iterated conformal maps is developed for quasistatic fracture of brittle materials, for all modes of fracture. Previous theory, that was relevant for mode III only, is extended here to modes I and II. The latter require the solution of the bi-Laplace rather than the Laplace equation. For all cases we can consider quenched randomness in the brittle material itself, as well as rando...