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APL 102

Fracture in Brittle Materials – Griffith Criterion

Concepts: Stress concentration, Plastic zone, Griffith theory, Flexural testing

Lecture 34
 Brittle Fracture
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Ideal fracture strength in Brittle solids (σ = E/6)

>>
Real materials failing strength (σ = E/1000)

Because of stress raisers (e.g. Flaws, cracks, hard phase),

which locally increase the stress levels
 Stress concentration
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 app  c
 max   app 1  2 
  
 max
For c = 1 m ;  =1 Å;
max=201 app

 app
=crack tip
radius

Distance from the crack tip

Magnitude of stress concentration can reach E/6

 Orientation and nature of stress field
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Orientation of flaws w.r.t. to stress axis is also key

Compressive stress
For which
crack will
propagate??
Tensile stress

 Cracks propagate when there is tensile stress perpendicular to the

crack surface.

 They do not propagate when there is compressive stress perpendicular

to the surface.
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Crack behavior in Materials
 Question for thought
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When you have a pre-existing crack in ductile material

How your material would respond to an external stress??

 Ductile material: Process Zone
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A plastic zone forms at the

crack tip where the stress
would otherwise exceed
the yield strength

Size of process zone:

Note the variation of plastic zone size with yield strength of material

Materials: engineering, science, processing and design, 2nd edition Copyright (c)2010 Michael Ashby, Hugh Shercliff, David Cebon
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Mechanism of ductile tearing

If a material is ductile, a plastic zone forms at

the crack tip

Within the plastic zone, voids nucleate, join,

and link to cause fracture

The plasticity blunts the crack tip, reducing the

severity of the stress concentration

Materials: engineering, science, processing and design, 2nd edition Copyright (c)2010 Michael Ashby, Hugh Shercliff, David Cebon
 Question for thought
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When you have a pre-existing crack in brittle material

How your material would respond to an external stress??

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Brittle ‘Cleavage’ Fracture

Characteristic of ceramics and glasses:

high yield strength very small plastic zone

Local stress rises as 1/√r toward the crack tip

– if it exceeds that required to break inter-
atomic bonds they separate, giving a cleavage
fracture

Little or no crack blunting

Materials: engineering, science, processing and design, 2nd edition Copyright (c)2010 Michael Ashby, Hugh Shercliff, David Cebon
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Question for thought

Why do inflated balloon explode when you poke a pin to that???

Think about doing the same to a partially inflated balloon

– would you observe another explosion??

Why do we see such differences??

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Stored energy = Compressed gas + Elastic energy stored in rubber

membrane

Stored energy in balloon should be sufficiently large

There is some critical balloon pressure at which our pin sized flaw is
just unstable
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Imagine if you want to open a flaw by some amount

Work done by Gas pressure + Elastic energy > Tear energy

The quantity on left hand side increases by blowing

the balloon: critical pressure inside balloon
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Griffith Criterion
 Griffith’s relation
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Esurface  2 2ct

Etotal  Esurface  Estrain
 2
Estrain    2c 2t
2Y
c*= critical crack size
When tensile stress, σ is applied:
ΔE c  c*  Crack is stable

Esurface  4t  c c  c*  Crack will grow

The critical value (c*) can be

the larger σ,
c found by setting:
the smaller c*
is c* Etotal
E  Estrain  Esurface
0
Estrain  
 t 2
 c2 c c c*
Y
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Griffith’s equation: The critical fracture stress,
Competition between strain energy and surface energy

2 E
f 
c

f= fracture stress

E = Young’s modulus
 = surface energy
c = crack size
 Griffith’s equation: The effect of surface crack
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2 E
Griffith’s equation  f 
c

c = half crack size for internal crack c = full crack size for surface crack

 2c   

Surface crack of depth c as effective as an internal crack of length 2c

Surface crack is more deleterious than internal cracks

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Mechanical behaviour of Ceramics (glass)
 The strength of ceramics and glass depends on the mode of loading
 The compressive strength of a ceramic is 10-15 times greater than the tensile
strength

Materials Selection in Mechanical Design, 4th Edition, © 2010 Michael Ashby

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Distribution of cracks in ceramic materials
Implications of the distribution of crack lengths in ceramic parts

So there is volume dependence

on strength

A large specimen will usually fail at a lower stress than a small one, because
it is more likely to contain a larger crack.
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Choice of testing for ceramics

Why for brittle solids like ceramics we opt for flexural

strength test as opposed to tensile or compression test??

Complex shape geometry, stress

concentrations, more prone to failure

Flexural test: easy sample geometry

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Flexural strength (Next Week’s lab)

Strength of glass
measured
in 3 point bend test

The modulus of rupture (MOR)/flexural strength is the surface stress

at failure in bending – it is equal to, or slightly larger than, the failure
stress in tension

Materials Selection in Mechanical Design, 4th Edition, © 2010 Michael Ashby

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So what is the material property that measures the resistance to

the propagation of a crack?
 Announcement
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 Quiz 2: November 1st (Wednesday) @ 5:30 pm

Syllabus: Minor 1 & Topics after Minor 2 till today(25th Oct.)

 Next Compensating Class: 31st October (Tuesday) @ 6:00 to 6:50 pm, LH 325

 Attendance uploaded: Last date for informing discrepancies 27th Oct.

 Lab marks & Minor 1, Quiz marks: Will upload today. Last date for informing
any discrepancies is 30th Oct.
E-mail with a picture of the mark (subject: Re: APL 102…)