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| This paper extends the L-integral concept [1-3] to study the degradation of a brittle elastic plan caused by irreversible evolution: the coalescence between two neighborly located holes under tensile loading. Attention is focused on the change of the L-integral before, during, and after coalescence of the two holes. By using Finite Element Analyses, different orientations of the two holes and different coalescence path curves connecting the rims of the two holes are studied in detail. It is found that variable tendencies of the L-integral before, during, and after coalescence of the different orientations of the two holes are quite different. Unlike the single defect, the
L-integral for the two holes before coalescence could be either positive or negative representing energy release or energy absorbing induced from the two holes rotation, respectively. Whereas such feature disappears after coalescence of the two holes
occurs and a single complicated defect forms. It is concluded that the L-integral does
play an important role in description of the damage extent and damage evolution.
Thus, besides the M-integral [4-9], the L-integral as another outside variable feature
should also be adopted in description of damage evolution in brittle materials. |
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| Keywords:L-integral;Damage;Brittle material;Finite element method |
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