MME 467

Ceramics for Advanced Applications

Lecture 22
Fracture Toughness and
Toughening Mechanisms
Ref: Richerson, Modern Ceramic Engineering, Ch17, Marcel Dekker, 1992
Topics to discuss....

1. Fundamentals of fracture mechanics

2. Fracture toughness
3. Needs for toughening
4. Principles of toughening
4. Toughening mechanisms
 Introduction

 Ceramic components in most cases fail by unstable

propagation of flaws (pores, cracks or inclusions).

 The flaws in ceramics act as stress concentrators and

failure occurs at an applied stress which is much lower
than the theoretical stress.
 Ceramic materials lack a mechanism to relieve the stress build up at
the tip of flaws.
 This makes them notch-sensitive, and consequently their strength will
depend on the combination of applied stress and flaw size.

 The observed large scatter in strength is due to the scatter of flaw size
in a component.
 Fracture mechanics: Fundamentals
 Fracture mechanics deals with crack surface
displacement and the stresses at the tip of the crack.

Presence of microscopic
flaws (cracks, voids,
notches, etc.) acts as
stress concentrator and
amplify the applied
stress at the crack tip.
 For a long crack oriented perpendicular to the applied
stress, the maximum stress near the crack tip is:

a ½
sm  2 s0 rt
s0 = applied external stress
a = half length of crack (internal flaw)
(full length for surface flaw)
rt = radius of curvature of crack tip

 Crack propagates when the applied stress exceeds

to a certain critical value sC.
2Egs ½
sC = pa gs = specific surface energy, J/m2
Stress intensity factor
 The stress concentration at a crack tip is denoted by
the stress intensity factor, K, which depends on
 the applied load
 size of crack
KI , KII , and KIII
 geometry of component The subscripts I, II and III refer the mode of
direction of applied load with respect to the
position of crack
 The stress intensity factor : I – open mode where load is perpendicular to

sm a ½
the crack (as in tensile or bend test); most
frequently encountered for ceramic materials;
K= s 2 r II – shearing mode; III – sliding mode.
0 t

 K varies from one system to another, but when it reaches

the critical value, KC , it will remain constant for the
material, regardless of the crack or load type.
 Fracture toughness

 The fracture toughness indicates the amount of

energy that can be absorbed by the material ahead
of an internal flaws
Y = dimensionless constant, which
depends on specimen geometry
KIC = Ysy (pa)½ and manner of load application
sy = yield stress of defect-free material

 The higher the fracture toughness, the more difficult

it is to initiate and propagate a crack.
Fracture Toughness KIc (MPam)
Fracture Toughness KIc (MPam)
 Fracture toughness of selected ceramics

Ceramics E, GPa KIC , MPa m1/2

Al2O3 390 2.0 – 6.0
MgO 250 – 300 2.5
ZrO2 (cubic) 220 3.0 – 3.6
ZrO2 (partially stabilised) 190 3.0 – 15.0
SiC (single crystal) 460 3.7
Si3N4 (hot pressed) 300 – 330 3.0 – 10.0
WC 450 – 650 6.0 – 20.0
SiO2 (fused) 72 0.80
 Need for toughening of ceramics
 Condition for crack propagation:

sC  KIC Fracture toughness

Depends on material,
temperature, environment,
and rate of loading

 Thus, ceramics are brittle and susceptible to

catastrophic failure due to two reasons:
1. the ease of crack initiation
 due to a high degree of stress concentration of an applied load at very
small microstructural or surface flaws
2. the ease of crack propagation
 due to the low fracture toughness of most ceramic materials
 Principles of toughening

 The inherent brittleness due to flaw sensitivity and low

fracture toughness provide a challenge to achieve
reliability of ceramics in structural applications.

 So, if we are to avoid this brittle fracture, the challenge

is to build into the ceramic microstructure mechanisms
that either
1. allow the material to withstand the concentration of stored
energy at the crack tip, or
2. to delocalise (spread out) the energy.
 Toughening mechanisms

 A variety of approaches have been used to enhance

their fracture toughness and resistance to fracture.

 The common toughening mechanisms:

1. Modulus transfer
2. Pre-stressing
3. Crack deflection or impediment
4. Crack bridging
5. Fibre pull out
6. Crack shielding
 I. Modulus Transfer
 Use of high elastic modulus fibres in a low elastic
modulus matrix.
 The stress applied to the material is “transferred” from the
matrix to the fibres, so that the high-modulus, high-strength
fibres carry the load.
Examples:
glass/carbon fibre reinforced polymer
boron/silicon fibre reinforced metal
carbon fibre reinforced concrete

 Factors controlling the degree of toughening:

1. Modulus difference between fibres and matrix, and fibres strength
2. Volume fraction of fibre and architecture of fibre distribution
3. Length of fibre
4. Interfacial bond between fibres and matrix
 II. Pre-stressing
 Involves placing a portion of ceramic under a residual
compressive stress.
 Tensile fracture will only occur after a large enough applied
load exceeds the compressive prestress and the build up
tensile stress becomes large enough to initiate a crack at a
critical flaw

 Methods of developing compressive prestress:

1. By placing the surface in compression
 Done by (1) quenching, (2) ion exchanging, or by (3) layering
2. By using fibres
 Done by (1) the fibres elastically stressed in tension before
applying the matrix, or by (2) utilising a thermal mismatch
between the fibre and the matrix
 III. Crack Deflection or Impediment
 Fracture toughness is strongly affected by the
microstructure of ceramics and by the path that a crack
follows as it propagates through the material.

1. Crack following a planar, smooth path

(as in single crystal or glass)
 the new surface produced is a minimum, resulting low fracture energy or
the fracture toughness

2. Crack following differently orientated grains and

grain boundary (as in polycrystalline ceramics)

 crack follows some weak grain boundaries, and fractured through

some weak grains
 the new surface generated as the crack propagates is greater, resulting high
fracture toughness.
Fig. 2a: Fig. 2b:
Microstructure-controlled crack Schematic of crack deflection
deflection mechanism at grain boundaries

 Reduction of stress intensity at the crack tip:

 3 θ Ktip = stress intensity at crack tip

K tip =  cos  K app Kapp = applied stress intensity
 2 q = angle of deflection
 For an average q value of 45o, KIC increases by about
1.25 times above the single crystal value.

Example:
Single crystal, KIC = 0.3-2.0 MPa.m1/2
Glass KIC = 1.0
Equiaxed polycrystalline ceramics KIC = 2.0- 4.0

 Methods of increasing the crack deflection or impediment

1. controlled grain boundary phase,
2. multimodal grain structure,
3. elongated or fibrous grain structure, and
4. dispersing foreign particles, plates, whiskers, or chopped fibres
 Fig. 3:
Predicted relative change in
fracture toughness versus
shape of dispersed particles.

For 0.5 vol.% particles

spherical particle KIC increases by a factor of 2
disc-shaped particle KIC increases by a factor of 3
rod-shaped particle KIC increases by a factor of 4

For 20 vol.% SiC whiskers added MoSi2 composites

q increases from 7.2 to 13 deg
Toughness increases from 5.3 to 8.3 MPa m1/2 (about 50 %)
 IV. Crack Bridging

 Toughening results from bridging of the crack surface

behind the crack tip by a strong reinforcing phase.
 These bridging ligaments can be whiskers, continuous
fibres, or elongated or ductile grains

Fig. 4:
Increase in fracture toughness by
the bridging of cracks by long fibres.

 It is a major toughening mechanism for ceramics

reinforced with long fibres
 V. Whisker and Fibre Pullout
 Composites that exhibit whisker or fibre debonding and
frictional sliding have pull out contribution to toughness.
 Part of energy is spent to friction as fibre, particle, or
grain slides against each adjacent microstructural
features, which effectively increase fracture toughness.
 Pullout often accompanied bridging.

 Toughening by fibre pullout is proportional to

1. the fibre content
2. fibre strength, and
3. fibre radius
and inversely proportional to
1. fibre-matrix interfacial shear strength
Fig. 5:
Fibre pullout and debonding in fibre reinforced ceramic matrix composites
VII. Crack Shielding
 Stress-induced microstructural changes result in
a reduction in stress at the crack tip.

 The effect occurs in a zone around the crack tip and

extending back along the crack.

 The extent of the zone affects the degree of stress

shielding at the crack tip.

 Methods so far have been identified:

1. microcracking
2. ductile zone
3. transformation zone.
 Transformation toughening
 A very powerful mechanism of toughening can occur
in a few ceramic materials which undergo a type of
martensitic transformation.
Example: 1. Zirconia (ZrO2)
2. Hafnia (HfO2)
3. Dicalcium silicate (Ca2SiO4)

 In these materials, the martensitic phase transformation

occurs on cooling from a high temperature and results in
a volume increase.

 The martensitic nature of the transformation is important

 not normally thermally activated transformations, don’t need
diffusion and can occur instantaneously.
 the transformation can occur quickly enough to affect the
behaviour of a running crack.
 In zirconia, for example
 it goes through a spontaneous athermal martensitic phase
transformation at about 1150 C from high temperature tetragonal
form to room temperature monoclinic form
 the transformation will induce about a 6 % volume increase and 7 %
shear distortion, which in turn place the zone ahead of the crack
front in compression
 By controlling
(1) the composition
(2) grain size
(3) the heat treatment cycle
zirconia can be maintained in its metastable tetragonal
phase at room temperature.

 Factors that triggers the transformation of finely

dispersed tetragonal zirconia phases in a matrix:
1. the approaching crack front (being a free surface)
2. surface grinding or abrading
 Martensitically Original untransformed
transformed monoclinic metastable tetragonal
zirconia particle zirconia particle

 Ahead of a crack in a brittle

material, the accumulation
of stress relieves the
constraint preventing the
transformation.
 This creates a region Compressive stress
field around crack tip
ahead of the crack where
transformation is possible Fig. 6:
Transformation zone ahead and around the
crack tip

 After transformation in the stress field, the particles are

now in their stable state and form a transformed zone on
either side of the crack.
 Size of transformation zone
 Transformation occurs in the region ahead of the crack
where the critical stress for transformation st is reached.

 The critical stress depends on the average particle size

of the metastable particles.
 with small particle sizes, the critical stress will be large (lots of
constraint from matrix) and the width of the transformation zone
will be narrow. Limited toughening.
 if the particles are too large, the critical stress will be small or zero
(very little constraint from matrix); they may transform spontaneously
even in the absence of a crack. Limited or no toughening.

 The ideal microstructure has all the metastable particles

at the same size, just below the spontaneous
transformation size. This will give the biggest possible
transformed zone around the crack.
 Transformation toughening that works so well at
ambient temperatures – mainly due to the tetragonal
phase – is ineffective at elevated temperatures.
 Increasing the temperature reduces the driving force for
transformation and consequently the extent of the transformed
zone, leading to less tough materials

 Pure ZrO2 does not have transformation-toughening

behaviour.
 Additives such as CaO, MgO, Y2O3, CeO2, and rare earth
oxides are required to stabilise such behaviour.
 Too much additions fully stabilises the ZrO2 in a cubic crystal
structure, which also does not have transformation-toughening
behaviour.
 Peak of curve
– maximum tetragonal phase
Left of peak
– monoclinic phase increases
Right of peak
– cubic phase increases

Fig. 7:
Fracture toughness versus composition for
transformation toughened zirconia materials