• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.5
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• pp.1726-1746
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• 2022

This paper presents fracture mechanics analysis results for various cracks located at pressurized water reactor pressure vessel nozzle crotch corners taking into consideration constraint effect. Technical documents such as the ASME B&PV Code, Sec.XI were reviewed and then a fracture mechanics analysis procedure was proposed for structural integrity assessment of various nozzle crotch corner cracks under normal operation conditions considering the constraint effect. Linear elastic fracture mechanics analysis was performed by conducting finite element analysis with the proposed analysis procedure. Based on the evaluation results, elastic-plastic fracture mechanics analysis taking into account the constraint effect was performed only for the axial surface crack of the reactor pressure vessel outlet nozzle with cladding. The fracture mechanics analysis result shows that only the axial surface crack in the reactor pressure vessel outlet nozzle has the stress intensity factor exceeding the low bound of upper-shelf fracture toughness irrespectively of considering the constraint effect. It is confirmed that the J-integral for the axial crack of the outlet nozzle does not exceed the ductile crack initiation toughness. Hence, it can be ensured that the structural integrity of all the cracks is maintained during the normal operation.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2000.04a
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• pp.159-164
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• 2000

The fracture behaviors of aluminum foils and sheet papers were analyzed on the basis of linear elastic fracture mechanics(LEFM). The fracture loads of the similarly shaped specimens were calculated by dimensional analysis. The actual fracture loads were measured using the simple tension equipment. The predicted fracture loads were compared with the experimental results.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.84-91
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• 1996

A fractal analysis on fracture surface of aluminium-particulate SiC composites was attempted. As the volume fraction of SiC in composites increases, the fractal dimension tends to increase. However, no correlation between the fractal dimension and the fracture toughness in terms of critical energy release rate was observed. Since the fractal dimension represents the roughness of fracture surface, the fracture toughness would be a function of not only fracture surface roughness but also additional parameters. Thus the applicability of fractal analysis to the estimation of fracture toughness must depend on the proper choice and interpretation of additioal paramerters. In this paper, the size of characteristic strctural unit for fracture was considered as an additional parameter. As a result, the size appeared to be a function of only volume fraction of SiC. Finally, a master curve for fracture toughness of aluminium-particulate SiC composites was proposed as a function of fractal dimension and volume fraction of SiC.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.301-310
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• 2008

Applications of fracture mechanics in the strength analysis of ceramic materials have been lately studied by many researchers. Various test specimens have been proposed in order to investigate the fracture resistance of cracked bodies under mixed mode conditions. Double Cleavage Drilled Compression (DCDC) specimen, with a hole offset from the centerline is a configuration that is frequently used in subcritical crack growth studies of ceramics and glasses. This specimen exhibits a strong crack path stability that is due to the strongly negative T-stress term. In this paper the maximum tensile stress (MTS) criterion is employed for investigating theoretically the initiation of brittle fracture in the DCDC specimen under mixed mode conditions. It is shown that the T-stress has a significant influence on the predicted fracture load and the crack initiation angle. The theoretical results suggest that brittle fracture in the DCDC specimen is controlled by a combination of the singular stresses (characterized by KI and KII) and the non-singular stress term, T-stress.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.11 no.6
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• pp.591-604
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• 2001

In this paper, a finite element with embedded displacement discontinuity which eliminates the need for remeshing of elements in the discrete crack approach is applied for the progressive fracture analysis of concrete structures. A finite element formulation is implemented with the extension of the principle of virtual work to a continuum which contains internal displacement discontinuity. By introducing a discontinuous displacement shape function into the finite element formulation, the displacement discontinuity is obtained within an element. By applying either a nonlinear or an idealized linear softening curve representing the fracture process zone (FPZ) of concrete as a constitutive equation to the displacement discontinuity, progressive fracture analysis of concrete structures is performed. In this analysis, localized progressive fracture simultaneous with crack closure in concrete structures under mixed mode loading is simulated by adopting the unloading path in the softening curve. Several examples demonstrate the capability of the analytical technique for the progressive fracture analysis of concrete structures.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.62-72
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• 2007

Fracture analysis of human bone is necessary to predict the failure of musculoskeletal structures and to heal them by several possible mechanisms under different loading conditions. But human bone is a complex material, with a multiphase, heterogeneous and anisotropic microstructure. Due to the difficulty of obtaining experimental and clinical results, the importance of numerical analysis and computational simulations in biomechanics are increasing gradually. In this study, stress analysis for human femur model is performed by using the 2-dimensional finite element method(FEM) and its stress distribution is determined. From these results, the fracture mechanic parameters are calculated and the fracture criteria on human femur are investigated and discussed.

• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 1995.10a
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• pp.171-177
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• 1995

Fracture mechanics does work for concrete, provided that one uses a proper, nonlinear form of fracture mechanics in which a finite nonlinear zone at fracture front is being considered. The fracture process zone is a region ahead of a traction-free crack, and the development of model of fracture process zone is most important to describe fracture phenomena in concrete. This paper is about fracture behavior of concrete cylinder under lateral pressure. Concrete cylinders were made of high strength normal connote, steel fiber reinforced concrete and steel fiber reinforced polymer-impregnated concrete and concrete and the fracture behavior such as cracking propagation and ultimate load are observed. The fracture process zone is modelled by a Dugdale-Barenblatt type model with linear tension-softening curve and are implemented to the boundary element technique for the fracture analyses of the cylinders. The experimental results are compared with analysis results and tension-softening curves for the steel fiber reinforced concrete and steel fiber reinforced polymer-impregnated concrete are obtained by back analyses.

• Transactions of Materials Processing
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• v.14 no.7 s.79
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• pp.601-606
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• 2005

A hole expansion process is an important process in producing a hub-hole in a wheel disc of a vehicle. In this process, the main parameter is the formability of a material that is expressed as the hole expansion ratio. In the process, a crack is occurred in the upper edge of a hole as the hole is expanded. Since prediction of the forming limit by hole expansion experiment needs tremendous time and effort, an appropriate fracture criterion has to be developed for finite element analysis to define forming limit of the material. In this paper, the hole expansion process of a hub-hole is studied by finite element analysis with ABAQUS/standard considering several ductile fracture criteria. The fracture mode and hole expansion ratio are compared with respect to the various fracture criteria. These criteria do not predict its fracture mode or hole expansion ratio adequately and show deviation from experimental results of hole expansion. A modified ductile fracture criterion is newly proposed to consider the deformation characteristics of a material accurately in a hole expansion process. A fracture propagation analysis at the hub-hole edge is also performed for high accuracy of prediction using the new fracture criterion proposed.

• Applied Microscopy
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.447-456
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• 1996

Fracture surfaces of materials contain useful information ranging from crack path to the mechanism of fracture. Since limitation of electron transparency requires a sample in the form of thin foil for TEM observations, it is impossible to extract such information directly from the fracture surfaces. In this study, the method of surface replication from the ceramic fracture surface is employed to characterize the process of crack propagation in ceramic matrix composites using TEM analysis. The surface replica from the fracture surface in ceramic materials provides detailed surface morphology and more importantly, loosened particles on the fracture surface are collected. Electron diffraction and chemical composition analyses of these particles reveal crack path in the specimen. Furthermore, one can determine the mode of fracture by observing the fracture surface morphology from the image of replica. Two examples are given to illustrate the potential of the surface replication technique. In the first example, apparent toughness increase in $B_{4}C-Al$ composites at high strain rate is investigated by surface replication to elucidate the mechanism of fracture at different strain rates. The polytypes of SiC formed during the sintering of SiC-AlN composite and their effect on the fracture behavior of SiC-AlN composite are analyzed in the second example.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.411-426
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• 2001

This paper treats the failure analysis of prestressing steel wires with different kinds of localised damage in the form of a surface defect (crack or notch) or as a mechanical action (transverse loads). From the microscopical point of view, the micromechanisms of fracture are shear dimples (associated with localised plasticity) in the case of the transverse loads and cleavage-like (related to a weakest-link fracture micromechanism) in the case of cracked wires. In the notched geometries the microscopic modes of fracture range from the ductile micro-void coalescence to the brittle cleavage, depending on the stress triaxiality in the vicinity of the notch tip. From the macroscopical point of view, fracture criteria are proposed as design criteria in damage tolerance analyses. The transverse load situation is solved by using an upper bound theorem of limit analysis in plasticity. The case of the cracked wire may be treated using fracture criteria in the framework of linear elastic fracture mechanics on the basis of a previous finite element computation of the stress intensity factor in the cracked cylinder. Notched geometries require the use of elastic-plastic fracture mechanics and numerical analysis of the stress-strain state at the failure situation. A fracture criterion is formulated on the basis of the critical value of the effective or equivalent stress in the Von Mises sense.