Discrete dislocation analysis of a plastic shear crack

Abstract

A detailed discrete dislocation analysis has been carried out in order to understand the behavior of a shear crack. It is found that a shear crack can be classified broadly into four categories based on its elastic and plastic behavior. The realistic growth of a plastic crack is found to take place by emission of lattice dislocations whenever the crack can reduce its energy, otherwise it expands elastically. The elastic energy released when the plastic crack forms is related to the self energy and interaction energy of the dislocations along with the frictional energy expended in creating the plastic zone. The plastic work for a plastic crack defined earlier by Orowan is obtained as a function of the energy terms contributing to the total energy of the plastic crack, namely the frictional work and the work done by the applied stress in creating the plastic zone.