A CONTINUUM MODEL FOR DYNAMIC DAMAGE EVOLUTION OF ANISOTROPIC BRITTLE MATERIALS

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the development of a computational model for the damage evolution of brittle materials under dynamic loading. Two models for dynamic damage evolution of brittle materials with or without microflaws in general anisotropic damage state are presented; the first one is based on power function of principal tensile stress and the second one is based on damage strain energy release rate. A second-order tensor based elastic–brittle damage model is formulated which is efficient computationally and consistent in its treatment of damage evolution. Measured Weibull strength distribution may be employed to account for flaw size distribution effects on the damage accumulation rate. Methods of computing the accumulated damage of a structural component and their implementation in a finite element program together with some numerical results are presented. Finally, a comparison has been made between the two damage models.