DIFFRACTION OF LOVE WAVES BY A STRESS-FREE CRACK OF FINITE WIDTH IN THE PLANE INTERFACE OF A LAYERED COMPOSITE

A rigorous theory of the diffraction of Love waves by a stress-free crack of finite width in the interface of a layered composite is presented. The incident wave is taken to be either a bulk wave or a Love-wave mode. The resulting boundary-value problem for the unknown jump in the particle displacement across the crack is solved by employing the integral equation method. The unknown quantity is expanded in terms of a complete sequence of expansion functions in which each separate term satisfies the edge condition. This leads to an infinite system of linear, algebraic equations for the coefficients of the expansion functions. This system is solved numerically. The scattering matrix of the crack, which relates the amplitudes of the outgoing waves to the amplitudes of the incident waves, is computed. Several reciprocity and power-flow relations are obtained. Numerical results are presented for a range of material constants and geometrical parameters. © 1979 Martinus Nijhoff Publishers.