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Dynamic measurements of initiation toughness at high loading rates

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Abstract

An experimental method is described for measuring the dynamic initiation toughness of a sharp stationary crack. A plane specimen is utilized which consists of a central region 50-mm wide and 200-mm long with integral dog-bone ends. The loading is accomplished by the detonation of four small explosive charges which produce two tensile stress waves upon reflection from the dog-bone ends. The stress waves meet at the midpoint of the specimen and reinforce to produce a relatively large, uniformly stressed region with a very high loading rate. The crack is positioned at the midpoint of the specimen at the location where the reinforcing tensile stress waves meet.

A series of photoelastic experiments were conducted using Homalite 100 as the model material to observe, in a full-field view, the arrival of the dilatational waves, the subsequent development of the stress field at the tip of the stationary crack and the initiation of the crack. The isochromatic fringe pattern was also used to determine the instantaneous value of the stress-intensity factorK(t) after the characteristic fringe loops developed in the region near the crack tip.

Finally,K(t) was measured using a single strain gage positioned and oriented so that its signal output was proportional toK(t) and independent of the next two higher order terms in the series representation of the strain field. A method was developed to determine the instant of initiation from the strain-time trace. Results obtained from the photoelastic and strain measurements of the dynamic-initiation toughnessK ID were consistently higher than the static value ofK IC .

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Dally, J.W., Barker, D.B. Dynamic measurements of initiation toughness at high loading rates. Experimental Mechanics 28, 298–303 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02329026

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02329026

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