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Griffith Energy Balance in Crack Growth

This document summarizes Griffith's energy balance approach for predicting crack growth and failure in materials. It discusses (1) how crack growth occurs through a balance of strain energy release and new surface energy creation, (2) the concept of surface energy and how it varies between materials, and (3) how Griffith's analysis can predict critical crack length through an energy balance equation involving remote stress, crack area, and surface energy. It also notes limitations of the Griffith approach and how Irwin and Orowan modified it to account for plasticity near crack tips.

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306 views8 pages

Griffith Energy Balance in Crack Growth

This document summarizes Griffith's energy balance approach for predicting crack growth and failure in materials. It discusses (1) how crack growth occurs through a balance of strain energy release and new surface energy creation, (2) the concept of surface energy and how it varies between materials, and (3) how Griffith's analysis can predict critical crack length through an energy balance equation involving remote stress, crack area, and surface energy. It also notes limitations of the Griffith approach and how Irwin and Orowan modified it to account for plasticity near crack tips.

Uploaded by

gidlavinay
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

Energy balance

• Griffith’s energy balance following First law of thermodynamics

• Formation of crack or growth of existing flaw


– Free surfaces are created inside the material

– There is annihilation of traction. This causes change in strain energy of


the adjacent material.

– This is possible only of the total energy decreases or remain constant.

– In a limiting critical case, the crack growth occurs under equilibrium


conditions with no net change in total energy

IIT Ropar, Punjab 1


Surface energy
• Every surface has a surface energy associated with its
existence.
• Atoms at surface has different coordination
– No neighbours on one side

To create new surface we need energy


equal to the surface energy gS

MS – 1.2 J/m2
Al – 0.6 J/m2
Diamond – 5.5 J/m2

IIT Ropar, Punjab 2


Griffith’s analysis
• A simple experiment
– Stretch the rubber sheet
– Put a crack with knife while holding the sheet at constant stretch
– A critical will reach when the crack will start growing on its own
without the help of knife
• How long is the critical crack length and how to predict it?

Points to note
➢ Sheet becomes less stiffer as
crack extends.
➢ The stress with in the plate
decreased and strain energy
reduces.
➢ The energy released
available for the crack to
grow.
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Griffith energy balance
• Plate subjected to remote stress, B >>a
• Crack area – 2aB
• Let the crack grow by creating addition area dA under
equilibrium conditions
• Total change in energy = 0
E = total energy
P = potential energy
WS = work required to
create new surfaces

Following Inglis’s solution:

Work required WS = 2X(2aXB)X gS

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Griffith energy balance

• After putting all the terms in energy balance


equation, we get

Failure stress

➢ Predicts the failure stress for ideally brittle materials very well but not for other
materials.
➢ Another issues is related to the absence of crack sharpness term which was
present in Inglis solution.
➢ Griffith prediction is insensitive to crack tip radius which is true only for cases
where a >> b.

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Griffith energy balance
• Other situations where Griffith criteria is applicable at
sharp microscopic cracks present near the macroscopic
flaw with a finite notch radius – happens in ferritic steels
• Limited validity of Griffith prediction is obvious

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Modified Griffith equation

• Irwin (1948) and Orowan (1948) independently modified the


Griffith expression for materials with plastic deformation/flow
– How common is it for two great mechanics people to reach same
equation following two different approaches?

gP = plastic work per unit area of crack andgP >> gS

Alternatively, we can write,

wf is the fracture energy term which includes surface energy, plastic, viscoelastic and
viscoplastic effects near the crack tip.
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Modified Griffith equation

Red alert!
The relation is valid for linear
elastic material behaviour. Any
nonlinear effect such as plasticity
must be confined to very small
region. It also assumed wf a
constant parameter which may not
be true is certain cases.

IIT Ropar, Punjab 8

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