Elastic stress intensity factors evaluated by caustics

Abstract

The practical usefulness of the concept of the stress intensity factor at a crack tip in an elastic medium in the theory of fracture mechanics has led to a variety of theoretical, as well as experimental techniques for the evaluation of these factors. Most of them concern the case of a crack inside an isotropic elastic medium under generalized plane stress or plane strain conditions, but several other cases have also extensively considered in the literature. Among the first theoretical treatments of crack problems in plane isotropic elasticity we can mention those included in the well-known monograph by Muskhelishvili [1], as well as in the well-known paper by Westergaard [2]. Today thousands of papers reporting elasticity solutions of crack problems and providing formulas and diagrams for the evaluation of stress intensity factors at crack tips can be found in the literature and are referenced in the recently appeared handbooks for the evaluation of stress intensity factors by Tada, Paris and Irwin [3] and Rooke and Cartwright [4]. Furthermore, the most important theoretical techniques for the solution of plane elasticity crack problems and the evaluation of stress intensity factors were reviewed by Paris and Sih [5] and Sih [6] in the first volume of this series.