Search

This paper presents the extension of some finite elements with embedded strong discontinuities to the fully transient range with the focus on dynamic fracture. Cracks and shear bands are modeled in this setting as discontinuities of the displacement field, the so-called strong discontinuities, propagating through the continuum. These discontinuities are embedded into the finite elements through the proper enhancement of the discrete strain field of the element. General elements, like displacement or assumed strain based elements, can be considered in this framework, capturing sharply the kinematics of the discontinuity for all these cases. The local character of the enhancement (local in the sense of defined at the element level, independently for each element) allows the static condensation of the different local parameters considered in the definition of the displacement jumps. All these features lead to an efficient formulation for the modeling of fracture in solids, very easily incorporated in an existing general finite element code due to its modularity. We investigate in this paper the use of this finite element formulation for the special challenges that the dynamic range leads to. Specifically, we consider the modeling of failure mode transitions in ductile materials and crack branching in brittle solids. To illustrate the performance of the proposed formulation, we present a series of numerical simulations of these cases with detailed comparisons with experimental and other numerical results reported in the literature. We conclude that these finite element methods handle well these dynamic problems, still maintaining the aforementioned features of computational efficiency and modularity.

This paper presents the extension of some finite elements with embedded strong discontinuities to the fully transient range with the focus on dynamic fracture. Cracks and shear bands are modeled in this setting as discontinuities of the displacement field, the so-called strong discontinuities, propagating through the continuum. These discontinuities are embedded into the finite elements through the proper enhancement of the discrete strain field of the element. General elements, like displacement or assumed strain based elements, can be considered in this framework, capturing sharply the kinematics of the discontinuity for all these cases. The local character of the enhancement (local in the sense of defined at the element level, independently for each element) allows the static condensation of the different local parameters considered in the definition of the displacement jumps. All these features lead to an efficient formulation for the modeling of fracture in solids, very easily incorporated in an existing general finite element code due to its modularity. We investigate in this paper the use of this finite element formulation for the special challenges that the dynamic range leads to. Specifically, we consider the modeling of failure mode transitions in ductile materials and crack branching in brittle solids. To illustrate the performance of the proposed formulation, we present a series of numerical simulations of these cases with detailed comparisons with experimental and other numerical results reported in the literature. We conclude that these finite element methods handle well these dynamic problems, still maintaining the aforementioned features of computational efficiency and modularity.

Plane strain deformations of an elastoplastic material are studied using numerical methods. In the first chapter, a meshless formulation of the static small strain elastic-plastic problem is formulated using the meshless local Petrov-Galerkin method. The code is validated against the small strain plasticity routines in the commercial finite element code ABAQUS for two basic configurations with loading, unloading, and reloading. The results are found to agree within 5%. The validated code is then used to analyze the stress intensity factor (SIF) in a double edge-cracked plate. Deformations of the plate are studied both with and without exploiting the symmetry conditions. The penalty method is used to enforce the essential boundary condition in the former case. When analyzing the deformations of the entire plate, the diffraction method is employed in order to introduce the discontinuity in the displacement field across the crack faces. The log-log and a higher order extrapolation technique due to Dally and Berger (1996) are used to calculate the SIF. It is found that the penalty method was inadequate to enforce the essential boundary conditions in the vicinity of the crack tip and that in this region the deformations were oscillatory. Consequently, the SIF calculation using the higher order technique was not accurate. It is also found that for a small plastic zone (3% of the cracked length) the SIFs do not differ significantly from their values for the corresponding linear elastic problem. In the second chapter, a finite element formulation of the dynamic deformations of a micro-porous thermoviscoplastic solid is formulated. The heat conduction in a material is assumed to be governed by a hyperbolic heat equation; thus thermal and mechanical waves propagate with finite speeds. The formation and propagation of an adiabatic shear band (ASB) inplane strain tensile deformations is studied for eleven materials. The ASB is assumed to form when the maximum shear stress has b

Four different thermoviscoplastic relations, namely, the Litonski-Batra, the Johnson-Cook, the Bodner-Partom and the power law are used to model the thermoviscoplastic response of a material. Each one of these relations accounts for strain hardening, strain-rate hardening and thermal softening of the material. The material parameters in these relations are found by solving an initial-boundary-value problem corresponding to simple shearing deformations so that the computed effective stress vs. the effective plastic strain curves match closely with the experimental data of Marchand and Duffy who tested thin-walled HY-100 steel tubes in torsion. These four viscoplastic relations are used to analyze dynamic thermomechanical deformations of a prenotched plate impacted on the notched side by a cylindrical projectile made of the same material as the plate. The impact loading on the contact surface is simulated by prescribing the time history of the normal component of velocity and null tangential tractions. A plane strain state of deformation is assumed to prevail in the plate and its deformations are studied for different values of the impact speed. The in-house developed finite element code employs constant strain triangular elements, one point integration rule, and a lumped mass matrix. The Lagrangian description of motion is used to describe deformations of the plate. The coupled nonlinear partial differential equations are first reduced to coupled nonlinear ordinary differential equations (ODEs) by using the Galerkin approximation. The ODEs are integrated by using the stiff solver, LSODE, which adaptively adjusts the time step size and computes the solution within the prescribed accuracy. Results computed with the four constitutive relations are found to be qualitatively similar to each other and the general trends agree with the experimental observations in the sense that at low speed of impact, a brittle failure ensues at a point on the upper surface of the notch ti

Four different thermoviscoplastic relations, namely, the Litonski-Batra, the Johnson-Cook, the Bodner-Partom and the power law are used to model the thermoviscoplastic response of a material. Each one of these relations accounts for strain hardening, strain-rate hardening and thermal softening of the material. The material parameters in these relations are found by solving an initial-boundary-value problem corresponding to simple shearing deformations so that the computed effective stress vs. the effective plastic strain curves match closely with the experimental data of Marchand and Duffy who tested thin-walled HY-100 steel tubes in torsion. These four viscoplastic relations are used to analyze dynamic thermomechanical deformations of a prenotched plate impacted on the notched side by a cylindrical projectile made of the same material as the plate. The impact loading on the contact surface is simulated by prescribing the time history of the normal component of velocity and null tangential tractions. A plane strain state of deformation is assumed to prevail in the plate and its deformations are studied for different values of the impact speed. The in-house developed finite element code employs constant strain triangular elements, one point integration rule, and a lumped mass matrix. The Lagrangian description of motion is used to describe deformations of the plate. The coupled nonlinear partial differential equations are first reduced to coupled nonlinear ordinary differential equations (ODEs) by using the Galerkin approximation. The ODEs are integrated by using the stiff solver, LSODE, which adaptively adjusts the time step size and computes the solution within the prescribed accuracy. Results computed with the four constitutive relations are found to be qualitatively similar to each other and the general trends agree with the experimental observations in the sense that at low speed of impact, a brittle failure ensues at a point on the upper surface of the notch ti