Stress Intensity Factor of a Circumferential Crack in a Thick-Walled Cylinder Under Thermal Striping

Abstract

This paper tries to explain the interesting field data that indicate a surface axisymmetric circumferential crack inside a hollow cylinder (circumferential crack) shows tendency toward crack arrest, when the temperature of the fluid inside the cylinder experiences sinusoidal fluctuation (thermal striping). For this purpose, transient stress intensity factor (SIF) range of a circumferential crack in a finite-length thick-walled cylinder with rotation-restrained edges, under thermal striping, was analyzed. It was assumed that the fluid temperature changes sinusoidally and that heat transfer coefficient is constant. First an analytical temperature solution for the problem was obtained and it was combined with our SIF evaluation method derived based on superposition principle and Duhamel’s analogy. Then we defined the maximum SIF range as the maximum value of the SIF range during thermal striping and studied the characteristic change of this maximum SIF range with the variation of crack depth to explain the crack arrest tendency. Results showed that the maximum SIF range under thermal striping decreases monotonously when crack depth is varied to become deeper than a specific value, which corresponds to the crack arrest tendency.