Variation of the stress intensity factor along the crack front of interacting semi-elliptical surface cracks

Summary

 In this study, the interaction between two semi-elliptical co-planar surface cracks is considered when Poisson's ratio ν = 0.3. The problem is formulated as a system of singular integral equations, based on the idea of the body force method. In the numerical calculation, the unknown density of body force density is approximated by the product of a fundamental density function and a polynomial. The results show that the present method yields smooth variations of stress intensity factors along the crack front very accurately, for various geometrical conditions. When the size of crack 1 is larger than the size of crack 2, the maximum stress intensity factor appears at a certain point, β₁=177^∘, of crack 1. Along the outside of crack 1, that is at β₁=0∼90^∘, the interaction can be negligible even if the two cracks are very close. The interaction can be negligible when the two cracks are spaced in such a manner that their two closest points are separated by a distance exceeding the small crack's major diameter. The variations of stress intensity factor of a semi-elliptical crack are tabulated and charted.