Abstract
Concrete is known to be a brittle material, yet there is no acceptable material parameter to quantify the fracture toughness of concrete. With an increase in efficiency and accuracy possible with numerical methods, a need to define a criterion for crack growth thus becomes evident. In this paper, various theoretical models which describe crack growth are summarized. It is shown that a single parameter such as classical stress intensity factor cannot adequately describe fracture processes in concrete. A recently proposed two-parameter fracture model is described. Some measurements of crack profile as the crack propagates observed using laser holography are also presented.
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For practical reasons, it was impossible to include this invited paper in the proceedings of the RILEM Congress.
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Shah, S.P. Fracture toughness of cement-based materials. Materials and Structures 21, 145–150 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02472850
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02472850