EXPERIMENTAL AND THEORETICAL STRAIN DISTRIBUTIONS FOR STATIONARY AND GROWING CRACKS

Experimental strain distributions are determined very near the crack tip in Fe-3wt.%Si single crystals. Both in situ stereoimaging and electron channeling techniques give reasonably reproducible distributions. By growing fatigue cracks on a {100} cleavage plane, the singularity strengths have been determined for both growing and stationary cracks under relatively plane stress and plane strain conditions. This has allowed a comparison to existing theoretical models. It is shown that the HRR singularity (Hutchinson, Rice and Rosengren, 1968) for stationary cracks is very good to within I μm of the crack tip and a hardening model for the growing crack (gao and hwang, Advances in Fracture Research, edited by D. Francois. 5th Int. Conf. on Fracture, Cannes, France, 2, 669, 1981) is surprisingly good. Other issues such as fracture criteria are discussed since strains greater than unity were measured at the crack tip in this relatively brittle material. © 1989.