Modeling of Dynamic Fracture and Fragmentation

The present discussion of continuum modeling of dynamic fracture is not an exhaustive review. Rather, it points out the variety of approaches which have been, and are still being, pursued to provide methods for calculating dynamic fracture phenomena. Such work is still quite active and considerable effort 

A void nucleation and growth fracture model embedded in a general viscoelastic-plastic material model is representative of approaches to ductile dynamic fracture (Davison et al., 1977 Kipp and Stevens, 1976). Other approaches include employing the plastic strain as a damage variable (Johnson and Cook, 1985) so that both spall and large strain-to-failure can be treated. 

Numerical simulation of a complex dynamic fracture application can be illustrated by calculations of impact induced damage in a ceramic cylinder. The computer model used was originally developed for oil shale explosive fragmentation (Grady and Kipp, 1980), with various extended applications considered by Boade et al. (1981) and Chen et al. (1983). In this model, stress and strain are related through 

The parameter is a crack propagation velocity and n(e) is a crack activation law driven by the bulk tensile strain e and specified by the Weibull fracture theory 

The parameters for the model were originally evaluated for oil shale, a material for which substantial fracture stress and fragment size data depending on strain rate were available (see Fig. 8.11). In the case of a less well-characterized brittle material, the parameters may be inferred from the shear-wave velocity and a dynamic fracture or spall stress at a known strain rate. In particular, is approximately one-third the shear-wave velocity, m has been shown to be about 6 for various brittle materials (Grady and Lipkin, 1980), and k can then be determined from a known dynamic fracture stress using an analytic solution of (8.65), (8.66) and (8.68) in one dimension for constant strain rate. 

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Although progress in continuum and computer modeling of dynamic fracture and fragmentation is encouraging, it is apparent that further advancements are needed. Many of the emerging physical and statistical concepts, some of which have been discussed in the present chapter, are not yet included in these... 

Finally the concepts of fragment size, and fracture number or frequency statistics, need to be included within the framework of continuum and computational modeling of dynamic fracture and fragmentation. This challenging area of research has the potential for addressing many needs related to dynamic fragmentation. 

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