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Determination of Microcrack Surface Area Caused by Fracture in Quasi-Brittle Solids Using Grafea Simulations
Abstract
A method for estimating the crack free surface area created by distributed microcracks for quasi-brittle materials is proposed and tested within the quasi-static regime of the two-dimensional (2D) non-local GraFEA (Graph-based Finite-Element Analysis) finite-element (FE) framework. This method defines a failure probability of the material in a micro-region area (defined by an assumed minimum microcrack segment length) of a simulated sample. This microcrack density is calculated for each FE within a sample domain, which leads to a quantitative estimate for the crack free surface area when summed over the domain. To ensure convergence of this estimation with respect to FE mesh density, coupled Abaqus/GraFEA simulations of three 2D quasi-static boundary value problems were performed with various FE mesh refinements. These allowed a sufficient FE mesh refinement to be determined which will ensure convergence of free surface area creation and force-displacement response results. This data, along with the experimentally determined fracture energy of the material, was then used to estimate the fracture energy absorbed during the simulations, and reasonable results were achieved. Therefore, the estimation of free surface area created in 2D quasi-static GraFEA simulations was confirmed to be a viable approach.
Subject
Quasi-brittle fractureGraph-based FEA
Constitutive theory
Non-local fracture
Crack length
Free surface area creation
Collections
Citation
Lawrence, Carson Glenn (2023). Determination of Microcrack Surface Area Caused by Fracture in Quasi-Brittle Solids Using Grafea Simulations. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /202846.