Abstract
In structural applications, brittle materials such as soda-lime glasses and ceramics are usually subjected to multiaxial stress state. Brittle materials with cracks or damage by foreign object impacts are apt to fracture abruptly from cracks, because of their properities of very high strength and low fracture toughness. But in most cases, the residual strength of structural members with damage has been tested under uniaxial stress condition such as the 4-point bend test. Depending upon the crack pattern developed, the strength under multiaxial stress state might be different from the one under uniaxial. A comparative study was carried out to investigate the influence of stress state on the residual strength evaluation. In comparable tests, the residual strength under biaxial stress state by the ball-on-ring test was greater than that under the uniaxial one by the 4-point bend test, when a small size indendation crack was introduced. In the case that crack having an angle of 90deg. to the applied stress direction, the ratio of biaxial to uniaxial flexure strength was about 1.12. The residual strength was different from crack angles to loading direction when it was evaluated by the 4-point bend test. The ratio of residual strength of 45deg. crack to 90deg. one was about 1.20. In the case of specimen cracked by a spherical impact, it was shown that an overall decrease in flexure strength with increasing impact velocity, and the critical impact velocity for formation of a radial and/or cone crack was about 30m/s. In those cases that relatively large cracks were developed as compared with the case of indented cracks, the ratio of residual strength under biaxial stress state to one uniaxial became small.
