element free galerkin method for crack analysis of orthotropic plates

a new approach for analyzing cracked problems in 2d orthotropic materials using the well-known element free galerkin method and orthotropic enrichment functions is proposed. the element free galerkin method is a meshfree method which enables discontinuous problems to be modeled efficiently. in this study, element free galerkin is extrinsically enriched by the recently developed crack-tip orthotropic enrichment functions. also, a suitable way is applied to select support domains near a crack so that the discontinuity can be modeled without the heaviside enrichment function. crack-tip enrichment functions span the possible displacement space that may occur in the analytical solution. for evaluating the mixed-mode stress intensity factors, the interaction integral is applied. some numerical examples are simulated to investigate the efficacy of the new approach by comparing with other numerical or (semi-) analytical methods.