MME 467

Ceramics for Advanced Applications

Lecture 29
Design with Brittle Ceramics 2:
Problem Solving
Problem 1.
The strength of 10 nominally identical ceramic bars were
measured and found to be 387, 350, 300, 420, 400, 367, 410,
340, 345 and 310 MPa.
Determine the Weibull parameters (m, s0) for this material.
 Answer #1

1
rank ln(-ln
s (n) pf ln(s) (1-pf))
300 1 0.091 5.704 -2.349 0
310 2 0.182 5.737 -1.604

ln (-ln (1-Pf))
340 3 0.273 5.829 -1.143
345 4 0.364 5.844 -0.792 -1
350 5 0.455 5.858 -0.499 y = 8.5829x - 51.035
367 6 0.546 5.906 -0.236 -2
387 7 0.637 5.959 0.014
400 8 0.728 5.992 0.264
410 9 0.819 6.017 0.537 -3
420 10 0.91 6.041 0.879 5.6 5.8 6 6.2
ln (stress)

1. From the plot: Weibull modulus, m = 8.58

2. From the plot: - m ln s0 = - 51.035; s0 = 383 MPa
Problem 2.
A series of tests on a ceramic component indicate that 25% of
the samples fail at stresses below 207 MPa whereas only 10%
fail at stresses below 198 Mpa.
Determine the Weibull modulus and the maximum allowable
stress if only 1 failure per 1000 specimens can be tolerated.
  s  m 
Answer #2 Ps  exp   
 s 0  
Pf1 = 0.25
s1 = 207 MPa ln ln Ps1 /ln Ps 2 
m
ln s 1 / s 2 
Pf2 = 0.10
s2 = 198 MPa ln ln 0.75 /ln 0.90
m  22.70
ln 207 / 198

Ps1 = 0.90  ln Ps1   s1 

ln    m ln  
s1 = 198 MPa
 ln Ps 2  s2 
 ln 0.90   198 
Ps2 = 0.999 ln    22.7 ln  
s2 = ?  ln 0.999   s2 
s 2  161.3 MPa
Problem 3.
A series of alumina bars 100x10x5 mm in section were
tested in uniform tension to give a mean strength of 320
MPa and a Weibull modulus of 16.
Determine the expected failure stress if a set of otherwise
identical samples with a 5 mm square cross section and
75 mm in length were tested in the same way.
If we assume that all the strength limiting flaws were
concentrated on the specimen surfaces what would you
expect the mean failure strength of the smaller specimen
to be?
Answer #3

1/ m
s 1  V1  s1 = 320 MPa
  
s 2  V2  m = 16
V1 = 100x10x5 = 5000 mm3
 s 1  1  V1  V2 = 75x5x5 = 1875 mm3
ln    ln   s2 = ?
 s 2  m  V2 
 s 1  1  5000 
ln    ln    0.06
 s 2  16  1875 
s 2  s 1 e 0.06  320 1.06  340.23 MPa
Considering flaws at the surfaces only

1/ m
s 1  A1 
  
s 2  A2 
 s 1  1  A1 
ln    ln  
 s 2  m  A2 
 s 1  1  2(100 x10  100 x5 
ln    ln    0.043
 s 2  16  2(75x5  75x5) 
s 2  s 1 e 0.043  3201.044  334.17 MPa
Problem 4.
A set of ceramic bars of 5 mm cross section and 100 mm
length are tested in 3-point bend with the outer loading
points spanning 90 mm. This data was analysed to give a
mean MOR of 380 MPa and a Weibull modulus of 14.
Determine the mean expected stress for an identical
sample set tested in 4-point bend with the outer and inner
loading points spanning 90 mm and 30 mm respectively.
 3-pt Bend data
Answer #4 MOR =380 MPa
m=14

1
Lf 3 pt 
1/ m 2(m  1) 2
s 1  Lf 2 
  
 L1  mL2 
s 2  Lf1  Lf 4 pt 
1
 
2 
2(m  1)  L1 
 s 1  1  Lf 2 
ln    ln  
 s 2  m  Lf1 
 s 1  1  L1  mL2  1  90  14(30) 
ln    ln    ln    0.124
 s 2  m  L1  14  90 
380
 e 0.124
s2
s 2  335.68 MPa