An Analytical and Experimental Study of Mixed-Mode Ductile Fracture under Nonproportional Loading

Abstract

The paper presents an investigation of mixed-mode ductile fracture for biaxial tension plates containing a central crack of varying inclination angles under non proportional loading. The critical fracture loads at crack initiation as well as crack initia tion angles are obtained for each of the three prescribed nonproportional loading paths. The experimental measurements are then compared to those predicted by finite element analysis based on an anisotropic damage mechanics model which has been developed ear lier by Chow and his co-workers and employed to characterize successfully, various damage-affected fracture problems including mixed-mode crack initiation and propagation under proportional loading [1-5].