Toughness is a complex material characteristic that is viewed from multiple aspects and is influenced by numerous factors. It is very important to have ability to assess toughness, i.e. to determine ductile or brittle material behaviour at any specific time. Beside total impact energy obtained at Charpy instrumented pendulum, the use of additional parameters such as lateral extension measuremen...

BASED on vast experience watching the fruit of my hard work fall apart time and again, I feel highly qualified to discuss the manner in which systems break. In particular, the goal of this paper is to define and analyze systems which exhibit brittle behavior. This behavior is characterized by a sudden and steep decline in performance as system state changes as shown by point D along curve Ph in...

The brittleness of dental amalgam limits its use to sites in which tensile stresses can be kept at a minimum. If the cause for the brittleness could be ascertained, then an approach to correct this problem could be devised. Physical properties of metals are ultimately manifested in, and can be explained by, their microstructure. Through the work of several researchers,1-3 means of identifying t...

This thesis consists of three main chapters, an introduction, and an appendix. The introduction (chapter 1) gives a general historical introduction to the problem of brittle fracture in disordered media. Chapters 2 and 4 are concerned with various aspects of fracture in disordered fuse networks. Chapter 2 investigates the asymptotic properties of fracture strength distributions, and explores th...

Titanium screws have properties that make them ideal for applications that require both a high strength-to-weight ratio and corrosion resistance, such as fastener applications for aviation and aerospace. The fracture behavior of Ti-10Mo-8V-1Fe-3.5Al (TB3) alloy screws during assembly was explored. Besides visual examination, other experimental techniques used for the investigation are as follow...

The fracture mechanics parameters are used in different applications to formulae the classic criteria of failure as well as in computational models to analyze the concrete structures and other brittle materials. The parameters are determined using the specimens with notches. The study for assessing the influence of the notch curvature in specimen on fracture mechanics parameters, e.g. critical ...

This report presents the outcome of four fracture test series, addressing the ductile-to-brittle toughness behaviour of a nuclear reactor pressure vessel steel. Each test series corresponds to a specific test specimen geometry, tensile or three-point-bend, with a given degree of crack-tip constraint. A brief overview is given of available constraint-based fracture mechanics methodologies in the...

A new computational model for brittle fracture and fragmentation has been developed based on finite element analysis of non-linear elasticity equations. The proposed model propagates the cracks by splitting the mesh nodes alongside the most over-strained edges based on the principal direction of strain tensor. To prevent elements from overlapping and folding under large deformations, robust geo...