FAILURE PREDICTION OF A PLATE WEAKENED BY AN ELLIPTIC HOLE UNDER THERMAL OR MECHANICAL LOAD

The failure initiation and crack trajectory are predicted for a plate weakened by an elliptic hole under thermal or mechanical load. The closed form solutions are obtained by using the complex variable theory and the fracture behavior is predicted by applying the strain energy density criterion. The results lead to a number of important conclusions. A general trend is that failure initiation always occurs at the site near the interface with material inhomogeneity while the fracture trajectory tends to spread away from the boundary of an elliptic hole whether thermal or mechanical loads are imposed in the given problem. Fracture initiation is most likely to take place at the site with relatively low temperature accompanied by the presence of tensile stress. Depending on material geometry, kinking phenomena are observed at the boundary layer adjacent to the interface. In general, the critical load in compression is larger than that in tension.