Failure waves in glass under dynamic compression

Abstract

Abstract Plate impact (I-d strain) and bar impact (I-d stress) experiments were performed on soda lime glass and pyrex glass. Embedded manganin gauges were used to monitor stress-time profiles in both types of experiments. In the plate impact experiments we found that glass not only fails through inelastic (or densification) deformation, but also through a unique failure process which gives rise to a failure wave first observed by Kanel et al. in the Soviet Union in 1990. In the present work three independent observations were made that support the existence of failure wave in glass: (i) the spall strength below and above the HEL is zero behind the failure wave, (ii) a small recompression is present in the longitudinal gauge (embedded between glass and PMMA) profile due to the reflections of release waves from the advancing failure wave, and (iii) transverse stress (measured by transverse gauge) increases on the arrival of the failure wave. The transverse stress increases because the glass loses its shear...