ENMT617034 : FRACTURE MECHANICS AND FAILURE ANALYSIS

Fracture Mechanism
Fracture Toughness

Prof. Dr. Ir. Anne Zulfia, M.Sc.

Departemen Metalurgi & Material

Fakultas Teknik Universitas Indonesia

Basic concept fracture

mechanics
Protect material from failure
Crack driving force must be less than materials resistance

Failures?
The failure of engineering materials is almost always an undesirable event
for several reasons; these include human lives that are put in jeopardy,
economic losses, and the interference with the availability of products and
services.
Even though the causes of failure and the behavior of materials may be
known, prevention of failures is difficult to guarantee.

The usual causes are improper materials selection and processing and
inadequate design of the component or its misuse.
It is the responsibility of the engineer to anticipate and plan for possible
failure and, in the event that failure does occur, to assess its cause and
then take appropriate preventive measures against future incidents.

FAILURE
We as engineers are obsessed with failure.

We must be able to accurately predict failure loads and failure

modes of materials subject to environmental conditions, varying
strain rates, and shaped in different geometries.
Several Forms of Failure
Ductile Fracture
Brittle Fracture
Fatigue
Creep

Fracture
The separation of body by an applied static stress and at temperatures well
below the melting temperature of the material.

Ductile Fracture: Exhibit substantial plastic

deformation with high energy absorption. Stable
Brittle Fracture: Little or no plastic deformation low
energy absorption. Unstable

Ductile fracture is preferred because 1) ductile materials are generally

tougher and 2) there is more of a warning before failure.

Fracture
Fracture occurs when a material under a load breaks
into parts at temperatures much less than the melting
temperature of the material
While the stress can be shear, torsion or axial
Essentially two types of fracture interest us
ductile
brittle

Ductile failure only occurs after significant plastic

deformation
and, unlike brittle fracture, gives some warning that failure is
about to occur!

 Any fracture process involves two steps

crack formation
and propagationin response to an imposed stress

An applied tensile stress is amplified at the tip of a small incision or notch

Ductile failure
rough surface from
plastic deformation

characteristic
cup-and-cone
shape of ductile
fracture
initial
necking

cavity
formation

cavity
coalescence

crack
propagation
(in shear)

Ductile Fracture
Ductile fracture is preceded by extensive plastic
deformation
Ductile fracture is caused due to growth and
coalescence of voids (at the sites of inclusion)
Ductile fracture is a slow process , gives enough
precaution before catastrophic failure
Ductile fracture usually follows transgranular path
If the density of inclusion are more along grain
boundary, crack grows along boundaries leading to
fibrous or ductile intergranular fracture
If inclusions are not present, voids are formed at
severely deformed regions leading to localized slip
bands and macroscopic instability resulting in
necking or shear fracture

Intragranular
(Transgranular)

Plasticity retards crack growth and it

provides a factor of safety against over
loading or oversight in design.
Rupture by Necking

Intergranular

Rupture by Shear

Microscopic Fracture Mechanisms

Ductile Fracture
Nucleation
1. Cracking of second phase particles
2. Heterogeneous deformation causing loss of
cohesion of matrix/ particle interface
3. Control particle size, shape, strength,
adhesion, and volume fraction to control
nucleation

Microscopic Fracture Mechanisms

Ductile Fracture
Void growth

1. State of stress determines growth rate

2. Degree of strain hardening is indication of
resistance to void growth
3. Interparticle spacing determines limit of growth
prior to fracture

Dimple Formation: Mode I

Dimple Formation: Mode II

Brittle fracture
Fast crack growth without excessive or no
plastic deformation.
Fracture stress will be lower than yield
strength
Brittle fracture may be transgranular
(cleavage) or intergranular
Brittle fracture are mostly predominant in
metals with bcc crystal at cryogenic
temperature or at high strain rate.
Micro cracks initiated by fatigue loading
may lead to brittle fracture
HAZ induces high tensile residual stress
HAZ also reduces the ductility
Shrinkage tears in weld may also cause
brittle fracture

Cleavage
fracture

Intergranular
brittle fracture

What are the general characteristics of brittle

fracture?
Very little general plasticity - broken pieces can be fitted together
with no obvious plastic deformation;
Rapid crack propagation (one third the speed of sound), eg 1 km/s
for steel;
Low energy absorption;
Low failure load relative to load for general yield;
Usually fractures are flat and perpendicular to the maximum
principal stress;
Fracture always initiates at a flaw or a site of stress concentration.
Examples
Mild steel at low temperature;
high strength Fe, Al and Ti alloys;
glass; perspex
ceramics
concrete
carrots (particularly fresh ones)

Fundamentals of Fracture Mechanics

Simple fracture is the separation of a body into two or more pieces in
response to an imposed stress that is static (i.e., constant or slowly changing
with time) and at temperatures that are low relative to the melting
temperature of the material.
The applied stress may be tensile, compressive, shear, or torsional; the
present discussion will be confined to fractures that result from uniaxial
tensile loads.
For engineering materials, two fracture modes are possible: ductile and
brittle. Classification is based on the ability of a material to experience
plastic deformation.
Ductile materials typically exhibit substantial plastic deformation with high
energy absorption before fracture. On the other hand, there is normally little
or no plastic deformation with low energy absorption accompanying a brittle
fracture.
Ductile and brittle are relative terms; whether a particular fracture is one
mode or the other depends on the situation.

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FRACTURE MECHANICS