Solution of stress intensity factors of multiple cracks in plane elasticity with eigen COD formulation of boundary integral equation

The concept of eigen crack opening displacement （COD） can be defined as the COD of a crack in infinite plate under the tractions acting on the crack surface. By introducing this concept, the eigen COD formulation of boundary integral equation is proposed in this paper, together with the solution procedures for multiple crack problems in plane elasticity. With the proposed approach, the multiple crack problems can be solved with the conventional displacement discontinuity boundary integral equations in an iterative fashion with a small size of system matrix as that in the numerical Green’s function （NGF） approach but without the trouble to determine the complementary solutions since the standard boundary element discretization on the crack surface is no longer required with the proposed approach. Some numerical examples computing the stress intensity factors are presented and compared with those in literature to show the accuracy and the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

SINGULAR INTEGRAL EQUATIONS AND BOUNDARY ELEMENT METHOD OF CRACKS IN THERMALLY STRESSED PLANAR SOLIDS

Using the method of the boundary integral equation, a set of singular integral equations of the hear transfer problems and the thermo-elastic problems of a crack embedded in a two-dimensional finite body is derived, and then,its numerical method is proposed by the numerical method of the singular integral equations combined with boundary element method. Moreover, the singular nature of temperature gradient field near the crack front is proved by the main-part analysis method of the singular integral equation, and the singular temperature gradients are exactly obtained. Finally, several typical examples calculated.

Dual equations and solutions of I-type crack of dynamic problems in piezoelectric materials

This paper firstly works out basic differential equations of piezoelectric materials expressed in terms of potential functions, which are introduced in the very beginning. These equations are primarily solved through Laplace transformation, semiinfinite Fourier sine transformation and cosine transformation. Secondly, dual equations of dynamic cracks problem in 2D piezoelectric materials are established with the help of Fourier reverse transformation and the introduction of boundary conditions. Finally, according to the character of the Bessel function and by making full use of the Abel integral equation and its reverse transform, the dual equations are changed into the second type of Fredholm integral equations. The investigation indicates that the study approach taken is feasible and has potential to be an effective method to do research on issues of this kind.

NEW BOUNDARY ELEMENT METHOD FOR TORSION PROBLEMS OF CYLINDER WITH CURVILINEAR CRACKS

The Saint-Venant torsion problems of a cylinder with curvilinear cracks were considered and reduced to solving the boundary integral equations only on cracks. Using the interpolation models for both singular crack tip elements and other crack linear elements, the boundary element formulas of the torsion rigidity and stress intensity factors were given. Some typical torsion problems of a cylinder involving a straight, kinked or curvilinear crack were calculated. The obtained results for the case of straight crack agree well with those given by using the Gauss-Chebyshev integration formulas, which demonstrates the validity and applicability of the present boundary element method.

TRANSIENT RESPONSE OF A PIEZOELECTRIC CERAMIC WITH TWO COPLANAR CRACKS UNDER ELECTROMECHANICAL IMPACT

The transient response of two coplanar cracks in a piezoelectric ceramic under antiplane mechanical and inplane electric impacting loads is investigated in the present paper. Laplace and Fourier transforms are used to reduce the mixed boundary value problems to Cauchy-type singular integral equations in Laplace transform domain, which are solved numerically. The dynamic stress and electric displacement factors are obtained as the functions of time and geometry parameters. The present study shows that the presence of the dynamic electric field will impede or enhance the propagation of the crack in piezoelectric ceramics at different stages of the dynamic electromechanical load. Moreover, the electromechanical response is greatly affected by the ratio of the space of the cracks and the crack length.

THE PERIODIC CRACK PROBLEM IN BONDED PIEZOELECTRIC MATERIALS

The problem of a periodic array of parallel cracks in a homogeneous piezoelectric strip bonded to a functionally graded piezoelectric material is investigated for inhomogeneous continuum. It is assumed that the material inhomogeneity is represented as the spatial variation of the shear modulus in the form of an exponential function along the direction of cracks. The mixed boundary value problem is reduced to a singular integral equation by applying the Fourier transform, and the singular integral equation is solved numerically by using the Gauss-Chebyshev integration technique. Numerical results are obtained to illustrate the variations of the stress intensity factors as a function of the crack periodicity for different values of the material inhomogeneity.

ON THE PLANE PIEZOELECTRIC PROBLEM OF A LOADED CRACK TERMINATING AT A MATERIAL INTERFACE

The plane problem of a crack terminating at the interface of a bimaterial piezoelectric, and loaded on its faces, is treated. The emphasis is placed on how to transform this problem into a non-homogeneous Hilbert problem. To make the derivation tractable, the concept of the axial conjugate is introduced and related to the complex conjugate. The angle between the crack line and the interface may be arbitrary. Numerical results are given to illustrate the stress singularity at crack tip.

Analysis of multiple interfacial cracks in three-dimensional bimaterials using hypersingular integro-differential equation method

By using the concept of finite-part integral, a set of hypersingular integro-differential equations for multiple interracial cracks in a three-dimensional infinite bimaterial subjected to arbitrary loads is derived. In the numerical analysis, unknown displacement discontinuities are approximated with the products of the fundamental density functions and power series. The fundamental functions are chosen to express a two-dimensional interface crack rigorously. As illustrative examples, the stress intensity factors for two rectangular interface cracks are calculated for various spacing, crack shape and elastic constants. It is shown that the stress intensity factors decrease with the crack spacing.

THE BEHAVIOR OF TWO PARALLEL SYMMETRIC PERMEABLE CRACKS IN PIEZOELECTRIC MATERIALS

The behavior of two parallel symmetric cracks in piezoelectric materials under anti-plane shear loading was studied by the Schmidt method for the permeable crack face conditions. By using the Fourier transform, the problem can be solved with two pairs of dual integral equations in which the unknown variable is the jump of the diplacement across the crack surfaces. These equations were solved using the Schmidt method. The results show that the stress and the electric displacement intensity factors of cracks depend on the geometry of the crack. Contrary to the impermeable crack surface condition solution, it is found that the electric displacement intensity factors for the permeable crack surface conditions are much smaller than the results for the impermeable crack surface conditions.

TRANSIENT RESPONSE OF COPLANAR INTERFACIAL CRACKS BETWEEN TWO DISSIMILAR PIEZOELECTRIC STRIPS UNDER ANTI-PLANE MECHANICAL AND IN-PLANE ELECTRICAL IMPACTS

The dynamic response of multiple coplanar interface cracks between two dissimilar piezoelectric strips subjected to mechanical and electrical impacts is investigated.Solutions to two kinds of electric boundary conditions on crack surfaces,i.e.electric impermeable and electric permeable,are obtained.Laplace and Fourier transforms and dislocation density functions are employed to reduce the mixed boundary value problem to Cauchy singular integral equations, which can be solved numerically.The effects of electrical load,geometry criterion of piezoelectric strips,relative location of cracks and material properties on the dynamic energy release rate are examined.

Behavior of two parallel symmetry permeable cracks in functionally graded piezoelectric materials subjected to an anti-plane shear loading

The behavior of two parallel symmetry permeable cracks in functionally graded piezoelectric materials subjected to an anti-plane shear loading was investigated. To make the analysis tractable, it was assumed that the material properties varied exponentially with coordinate vertical to the crack. By using the Fourier transform, the problem could be solved with the help of two pairs of dual integral equations, in which the unknown variables were the jumps of the displacements across the crack surfaces. To solve the dual integral equations, the displacement on the crack surfaces was expanded in a series of Jacobi polynomials. The normalized stress and electrical displacement intensity factors were determined for different geometric and property parameters for permeable electric boundary conditions. Numerical examples were provided to show the effect of the geometry of the interacting cracks and the functionally graded material parameter upon the stress intensity factors of cracks.

Basic solution of two parallel non-symmetric permeable cracks in piezoelectric materials

The behavior of two parallel non-symmetric cracks in piezoelectric materials subjected to the anti-plane shear loading was studied by the Schmidt method for the permeable crack electric boundary conditions. Through the Fourier transform, the present problem can be solved with two pairs of dual integral equations in which the unknown variables are the jumps of displacements across crack surfaces. To Solve the dual integral equations, the jumps of displacements across crack surfaces were directly expanded in a series of Jacobi polynomials. Finally, the relations between electric displacement intensity factors and stress intensity factors at crack tips can be obtained. Numerical examples are provided to show the effect of the distance between two cracks upon stress and electric displacement intensity factors at crack tips. Contrary to the impermeable crack surface condition solution, it is found that electric displacement intensity factors for the permeable crack surface conditions are much smaller than those for the impermeable crack surface conditions. At the same time, it can be found that the crack shielding effect is also present in the piezoelectric materials.

Numerical Comparison Research on the Solution of Stress Intensity Factors of Multiple Crack Problems

A newly developed approach without crack surface discretization for modeling 2D solids with large number of cracks in linear elastic fracture mechanics is proposed with the eigen crack opening displacement (COD) boundary integral equations in this paper. The eigen COD is defined as a crack in an infinite domain under fictitious traction acting on the crack surface. Respect to the computational accuracies and efficiencies, the multiple crack problems in finite and infinite plates are solved and compared numerically using three different kinds of boundary integral equations (BIEs): 1) the dual BIEs require crack surface discretization;2) the BIEs with numerical Green’s functions (NGF) without crack surface discretization, but have to solve a complementary matrix;3) the eigen crack opening displacement (COD) BIEs in the present paper. With the concept of eigen COD, the multiple crack problems can be solved by using a conventional displacement discontinuity boundary integral equation in an iterative fashion with a small size of system matrix as that in the NGF approach, but without troubles to determine the complementary matrix. Solution of the stress intensity factors of multiple crack problems is solved and compared in some numerical examples using the above three computational algorithms. Numerical results clearly demonstrate the numerical models of eigen COD BIEs have much higher efficiency, providing a newly numerical technique for multiple crack problems. Not only the accuracy and efficiency of computation can be guaranteed, but also the overall properties and local details can be obtained. In conclusion, the numerical models of eigen COD BIEs realize the simulations for multiple crack problems with large quantity of cracks.

THE PROBLEM OF AN EXTERNAL CIRCULAR CRACK UNDER ASYMMETRIC LOADINGS

Using the boundary integral equation method, the problem of an external circular crack in a three-dimensional infinite elastic body under asymmetric loadings is investigated. The two-dimensional singular boundary integral equations of the problem were reduced to a system of Abel integral equations by means of Fourier series and hypergeometric functions. The exact solutions of stress intensity factors ore obtained for the problem of an external circular crack under asymmetric loadings, which are even more universal than the results obtained by the use of Hankel transform method. The results demonstrate that the boundary integral equation method has great potential as a new analytic method.

THE ANALYSIS OF CRACK PROBLEMS WITHNON-LOCAL ELASTICITY

In this pager, the displacement discontinuity fundamental solutions ( DDFS) corresponding to the unit concentrated displacement discontinuity for plane problems of non-local elasticity are obtained. Based on the displacement discontinuity boundary integral equation (DDBIE) and boundary element method (BEM), a method of analysis of crack problems in non-local elasticity with generalized purpose is proposed. By using this method, several important problems in fracture mechanics such as edge crack are studied. The study of edge crack shows that the stress concentration factor (SCF) near the crack tip is not a constant but varies with the crack length. With this result the effect of crack length on the fracture roughness K (I c) is studied. The results obtained in this paper are in accordance with the published ones.

Fracture analysis for torsion problems of a composite cylinder with curvilinear cracks

The Salnt-Venant torsion problems of a composite cylinder with curvilinear cracks were investigated. By considering the bimaterial interface as a boundary of the outer bar or inner one, the problem was reduced to the solution of boundary integral equations on the crack, external boundary and interface. Using the new boundary element method, some typical torsion problems of a composite cylinder involving a straight or kinked crack were calculated. The obtained results were compared with data in the literature to show validity and applicability of the present method.

ANALYSIS OF THREE-DIMENSIONAL EDGE CRACKS UNDER TENSILE LOADING

Three-dimensional edge cracks are analyzed using the Self-SimilarCrack Expansion (SSCE)method with a boundary integral equationtechnique. The boundary integral equations for surface cracks in ahalf space are presented based on a half space Green'sfunction(Mindlin, 1936). By using the SSCe method, the stressintensity factors are determined by crack-opening displacement overthe crack surface. In discrete boundary integral equations, theregular and singular integrals on the crack sur- face elements areevaluated by an analytical method, and the closed form expressions ofthe integrals are given for subsurface cracks and edge cracks.

INTERACTION OF ELASTIC WAVES WITH A PERIODIC ARRAY OF COLLINEAR INPLANE CRACKS

A boundary integral equation method is applied to the study of the interaction of plane elastic waves with a periodic array of collinear inplane cracks.Numerical results are presented for the dynamic stress in- tensity factors.The effects of the wave type,wave frequency,wave incidence angle,and crack spacing on the dynamic stress intensity factors are analyzed in detail.

PLANE ELASTIC PROBLEMS OF DIFFERENT MEDIA WITH CRACKS ON THE INTERFACE

The equilibrium problem for the infinite elastic plane consisting of two different media with many cracks on the interface is discussed. It is transferred to a boundary value problem for analytic functions and then further reduced to a singular integral equation, the unique solvability and an effective method of solution for which are established. A practical example in applications is illustrated, the solution of which is obtained in closed form.

Interfacial Crack Problem of a Class of Spliced Materials

The interfacial crack problem of a class of spliced materials is discussed. Using plane elastic complex variable method and integral equation theory, one method of solving the complex stress functions is given.