A simulated crack experiment illustrating the energy balance criterion

✍ Scribed by S.J. Burns; B.R. Lawn

• Publisher: Springer Netherlands
• Year: 1968
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 344 KB
• Volume: 4
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1573-2673
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00185268

✦ Synopsis

The Griffith energy balance fracture criterion, despite its central importance in the study of most fracture problems, has received very little experimental confirmation. One of the reasons for this is the inherent gross uncertainty in the value of the fracture surface energy "/in solids, This paper describes a simple experiment in which the rupture of a thin liquid film between two glass strips forced apart by a wedge is used to simulate the propagation of a crack. The resistance to rupture is provided by the surface tension of the liquid, which can be computed by observing the configuration of the bent glass arms and then compared with values measured by independent means. Such a comparison is made for a silicone oil, for which agreement in values of "/is obtained within the limits of experimental scatter, thereby permitting a direct confirmation of the energy balance equations.