Elastic–plastic near field solution of an eccentric crack under shear in a finite width plate

Abstract

The near crack line analysis method is used to investigate an eccentric crack loaded by shear forces in a finite width plate, and the analytical solution is obtained in this paper. The solution includes: the unit normal vector of the elastic–plastic boundary near the crack line, the elastic–plastic stress fields near crack line, variations of the length of the plastic zone along the crack line with an external loads, and the bearing capacity of a finite plate with a centric crack loaded by shear stress in the far field. The results obtained in this paper are sufficiently precise near the crack line because the assumptions of small scale yielding theory have not been made and no other assumptions have been taken. Subsequently, the present results are compared with the traditional line elastic fracture mechanical solutions and elastoplastic near field solutions under small scale yielding condition. On the basis of the minimum strain energy density (SED) theory, the minimum values of SED in the vicinity of the crack tip are determined, the initial growth orientation of crack are determined. It is found that the normalized load under large scale yielding condition is higher than those under small scale yielding condition when the length of the plastic zone is the same.