A Simple Method For Computing The Stress Intensity Factors For Cracks at Notches

A simple method for computing the stress intensity factors
for cracks at notches

R. Jones*, D. Peng
DSTO Centre of Expertise in Structural Mechanics (C0E-SM), Department of Mechanical Engineering,
Monash University, PO Box 31, Monash University, VIC 3800, Australia
Received 2 January 2002; accepted 28 January 2002
Abstract
This paper presents a simple method for calculating the stress intensity factors for cracks emanating from a notch
under arbitrary loading. A range of examples are presented to demonstrate the accuracy of the present method. #2002
Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.
Keywords: Stress intensity factors; Notches; Cracks; Airworthiness; Repairs
1. Introduction
Fatigue life extension strategies, such as shape reworking, are being increasingly used to restore the air-
worthiness and availability of ageing structural components. This often involves the reworking of local
structural details both to remove service induced cracking and to minimise the local peak stresses. Recent
developments in structural optimisation oer the potential for signicant improvements in determining the
optimum rework proles. However, in most of the structural optimisation work undertaken to date the
eect of an initial aw, after reworking, has not been accounted for. Hence the interplay of an initial
optimal rework shape (determined for the case when no crack was present) and an existing (initial) aw is
an important issue which needs to be addressed and which to date has received little attention, see [1].
Current optimum design tools do not readily lend themselves to treating fracture strength as a design
constraint. This is because the majority of the life of a component is frequently used up as cracks grow
from an initial non detectable (part elliptical) aw to a complex aw size, which is detectable. Thus at each
stage of the life of the component it is often necessary to analyse a complex 2-D or 3-D aw under arbi-
trary loading. The strain singularity along the crack (aw) front requires a ne numerical mesh. As a result
the structural optimisation problem becomes extremely time consuming and requires large computer
resources. The optimisation problem is further compounded by the need, for every geometry under con-
sideration, to allow for aws at every potentially critical point.
1350-6307/02/$ - see front matter # 2002 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.
PI I : S1350- 6307( 02) 00007- 9
Engineering Failure Analysis 9 (2002) 683702
www.elsevier.com/locate/engfailanal
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +61-3-9905-4000; fax: +61-3-9905-1825.
E-mail address: rhys.jones@eng.monash.edu.au (R. Jones).
To overcome this we need simple and accurate formulae for the stress intensity factors associated with
cracks at a stress concentrator, or a notch. Unfortunately, there are few solutions in the literature for this
class of problems. This has led to numerous attempts to obtain approximate solutions. Many of these
approximations have been developed and validated for particular types of loading and are limited to small
cracks.
The stress intensity factor for a crack emanating from a notch is frequently expressed in the form:
K Fo
l
p
. 1
where 1 is the crack length, o is the applied stress and F is a magnication factor.
The nite element alternating technique is commonly used to analyse cracking at notches [2,3], and was
used in the optimisation study presented in [1]. This is an iterative method that starts by considering an
embedded crack in an innite body. This (starting) solution is subsequently used to obtain numerical
solutions for cracks at a free surface or a notch. The present paper uses this initial solution to create a new
and simple method for estimating the stress intensity factor for cracks at a notch. The resultant solution
has the correct asymptotic form for both short and long cracks.
This solution has the potential to be used for problems associated with fatigue life extension and shape
optimisation, i.e. the rework shape that will give the optimum increase in the fatigue life. We also use the
present method to develop an approximate solution for an edge crack at a hole repaired with a bonded
composite repair, see [4]. This repair methodology is particularly applicable to the repair of cracked
fastener holes, and the repair of corrosion damage.
2. A simple approximate formulae
Broek [5] was amongst the rst to suggest a simple engineering method for estimating the stress intensity
factors for cracks emanating from a notch. Smith and Miller [6] subsequently proposed that the stress
intensity factor of small cracks at the root of a notch of the depth D and the notch radius ,, see Fig. 1,
could be expressed as, viz:
K
1 7.69
D,,
p
q
o
l
p
2
where for cracks greater than 0.13

D,
p
, the notch depth was added to the crack length.
Schijve [7] presented an excellent review of the existing literature and proposed that the stress intensity
factor could be expressed in the form, viz:
K Fo
max
l
p
3
where o
max
is the peak stress. In this work he also proposed that the geometry factor F was only a function
of the ratio l/,. Kujawski [8] subsequently modied this formulae by replacing the term o
max
by the local
stress distribution o
y
l at the distance l. This approximation is surprisingly accurate for uni-axial loading,
but can yield signicant errors for other loading states.
Lukas [9] proposed that F could be written as, viz:
F 1.12,
p
1 4.5 l,, 4
Benthem and Koiter [11] proposed a formulae which is commonly expressed in the form:
684 R. Jones, D. Peng / Engineering Failure Analysis 9 (2002) 683702
K 1.12o
max
0.683oo,ox
x0
j 1
1
p
5
where o
max
and oo,ox are the maximum stress and the stress gradient at the notch.
The nite element alternating technique [2,3] can also be used to solve this class of problems. This
method uses as its basis the solution K to the problem of a centre notch crack 2l long, i.e. an embedded
crack, in an innite plate acted upon by the same stress eld o
y
. t as found at the notch, see Fig. 2. In this
formulation we create a ctitious crack of equal length and the stress eld is mirrored across the boundary
of the notch, see Fig. 2.
This solution, i.e. K, can also be used when analysing cracking at stress concentrators associated with a
free surface, i.e. an external stress concentrator. In this case it is common to express K in the form:
K FK 6
Fig. 2. Schematic picture of the problem used to determine K.
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram showing notch, crack and the stress eld at the notch.
R. Jones, D. Peng / Engineering Failure Analysis 9 (2002) 683702 685
where F=1.12 is the usual free surface correction factor.
To illustrate this consider the problem of a centrally located elliptical notch with a total surface length
(2c) of 80 mm and a depth (a) of 20 mm located on the surface of a rectangular body 800400 mm, see
Fig. 3. The body is rigidly held at points A and B and is loaded with a point load of 10 000 kN, see Fig. 3.
The notch contains a centrally located crack of length l.
A comparison of the ratio of the predicted and computed values, using the nite element alternating
technique, is given in Fig. 4. This shows that the two techniques agree to within 5%.
All of the above approximate formulae are limited to specic problems types and/or small l/, ratios. The
challenge is to develop a more robust approximation. In this context Jones et al. [4] found that, for internal
circular holes, by choosing the form of Schijves [7] formulae to be as given in Eq. (6) excellent solutions
could be obtained for several problems and crack lengths.
Indeed, once the stress eld o
y
. t is known it is relatively easy to analytically evaluate K. With this form
for K Ref. [4] proposed that, for cracks at circular holes, the function F could be expressed as:
F 1,
p
2 1.12 1,
p
2

exp ol,, 7
which satises the requirements that F ! 1.12 as l,, ! 0, and F ! 1,
p
2 as l,, ! 1, so that the
expression for K has the correct asymptotic limits at both l,, ! 0, i.e. for short cracks, and l,, ! 1,
i.e. for long cracks.
By inspecting known solutions we nd that, as a rst approximation, o=0.8 for Mode I fracture and
o=0.32 for Mode II fracture. For cracks at circular holes Ref. [4] revealed that the accuracy of this
Fig. 3. Schematic diagram of an elliptical notch with a surface crack.
approximation can be improved by choosing o to be a function of l/r. If we denote the value of F for Mode
I as F
I
and its value for Mode II as F
II
then the recommended values are presented in Tables 1 and 2.
It is often convenient to express F as an analytical function of l/r. The functional forms used in this
work, which agree with the values presented in Tables 1 and 2 to within $5%, were:
i Mode I; o 0.8 1.0 0.3 l,, 0.13l,,
2
8
ii Mode II; o 0.32 if l,, - 1.3. and o 0.32 1.00.5l,, 1.3,l,, if l,, > 1.3. 9
Table 1
Recommended values for F
I
from Ref. [4]
l/r F
I
0.0 1.12
0.04 1.10
0.1 1.063
0.12 1.053
0.16 1.033
0.2 1.015
0.3 0.977
0.4 0.948
0.5 0.924
0.75 0.882
1 0.854
1.5 0.820
2 0.800
3 0.778
4 0.765
5 0.757
1 1,
p
2
Fig. 4. Comparison of predicted and numerical results.
Table 2
Recommended values for F
II
from [4]
l/, F
II
0.01 1.119
0.04 1.115
0.08 1.109
0.1 1.106
0.12 1.103
0.14 1.1
0.18 1.095
0.2 1.092
0.3 1.079
0.4 1.067
0.5 1.056
0.75 1.031
1 1.009
1.1 1.001
1.2 0.994
1.5 0.974
2 0.947
3 0.907
4 0.879
5 0.858
6 0.842
7 0.829
8 0.818
10 0.802
1 1/
p
2
Fig. 5. Schematic diagram of the test geometry.
To illustrate the accuracy of this initial approximation let us consider the cases:
(1) a circular hole of radius R under uniaxial load, i.e. o
1
=o, o
2
=0, see Fig. 5;
(2) a circular hole of radius R under a biaxial load, with biaxial a loading ratio l (=o
1
/o
2
)=1; i.e.
o
1
=o
2
=o;
(3) a circular hole of radius R under biaxial load with biaxial a loading ratio l=1; i.e. o
1
=o and
o
2
=o.
(4) a circular hole of radius R under biaxial load with biaxial a loading ratio l=o
1
/o
2
=1/100;
(5) an elliptical notch with aspect ratio c/a=2, o
1
=o, and o
2
=0. Here the radius of curvature , c
2
/
a=4a;
(6) an elliptical notch with aspect ratio c/a=0.5, i.e. ,=c
2
/a=0.25a, o
1
=o, and o
2
=0;
(7) an elliptical notch with aspect ratio c/a=0.5, i.e. ,=c
2
/a=0.25a, o
2
=o, and o
1
=0;
(8) an elliptical notch with aspect ratio c/a=2, i.e. ,=c
2
/a=4a, o
2
=o, and o
1
=0.
The non-dimensional results for the stress intensity factor K, divided by K
o
o
p
l, obtained in this
initial study are given in Figs. 611. In Figs. 69 we compare the results, for Cases 14, with the solution
given by Tweed et al. in [12] as well as with the approximations due to Schijve [7] and Lukas [9].
From these gures we see that although Lucas expression was reasonably accurate for a crack at a hole
under uniform uniaxial load, i.e. Case 1, it is not particularly accurate for other loading states. From these
gures we also see that, even at l/, ratios of greater than 1, Eq. (7) is in quite reasonable agreement with
known analytical results. However, Eq. (9) is generally more accurate. This can be seen in Fig. 6 where the
solution obtained using Eq. (9) is almost identical to that presented by Tweed et al. [12]. This agreement
can be seen in more detail in Fig. 13.
The results for Cases 5 and 6 are given in Figs. 10 and 11 together with the approximations due to
Schijve [7] and Kujawski [8]. We also include the solutions obtained using the formulae given by Tweed et
al. [12], together with the associated local curvatures and stress elds. In both gures the curves labelled
Eqs. (7) and (9) used the formulae given in Ref. [13] to calculate the stress eld at the notch. These
Fig. 6. Comparison of solutions for Case 1.
gures also show the results obtained using Eq. (9) and the stress eld obtained via nite element analysis,
see Section 4. These curves are labelled nite element in both Figs. 10 and 11.
For both Cases 5 and 6 Eq. (9) is in good agreement with Schijves formulae [7], for small l/, ratios,
Kujawskis approximation [8], and the solution obtained using Tweeds formulae [12].
The results for Cases 7 and 8, obtained using Eq. (9) and the local stress eld determined using nite
element analysis, see Section 4, are given in Fig. 12 along with the approximations due to Kujawski [8] and
the solution obtained using the formulae given by Tweed et al. [12] and the associated local curvatures and
stress elds. In this gure we again see that values obtained using Eq. (9) are in good agreement with those
obtained using Tweed et al., formulae [12]. However, the Kujawski approximation was only accurate for
small l/, ratios.
To further highlight the agreement between the present solution, i.e. Eq. (9), and known analytical
solutions Fig. 13 presents the results for a circular hole with load bi-axiality ratios l=1, 0 and 1.
Whilst the previous graphs have dealt with Mode I fracture let us now consider the following cases:
(9) a circular hole of radius R under remote uniform shear t, see Fig. 14.
(10) as above but with a constant shear stress t on the crack faces, see Fig. 14.
(11) an ellipse with aspect ratio c/a=0.5, see Fig. 5, under remote uniform shear t.
(12) an ellipse with aspect ratio c/a=2, see Fig. 5, under remote uniform shear t.
The results for these four cases, divided by K
o
t
p
l, are shown in Figs. 1517. For Case 9 we compare
the approximation with the solution given by Hsu [15] and Kotousov and Jones [16]. For Case 10 we
compare the approximation with the analytical solution given by Kotousov and Jones [16]. In both cases
the agreement is quite good. For Cases 11 and 12 we compare the approximation with the analytical
solution given by Kotousov and Jones [16].
From this study we see that for the 12 cases considered above the simple formula, presented in this paper, for
the stress intensity factor of cracks at the root of a notch is in good agreement with published values. Where
there are analytical solutions we nd that this expression yields values which, over the range of l/, values
considered, agree to within $5%. The resultant solution has the correct asymptotic form for both short and
long cracks and for short cracks is generally in good agreement with the approach suggested by Schijve [7].
Fig. 12. Comparison of solutions for Cases 7 and 8.
3. Application to composite repairs
The work presented in the previous sections was undertaken to support fatigue life extension studies
whereby the fatigue life is enhanced by reworking the critical region. However, composite repairs can also
be used to extend fatigue life, see Refs. [1726]. This method has proved to be eective and highly cost
ecient compared with conventional repairs, see Table 3. Composite repairs are particularly applicable to
the repair of cracked fastener holes and the repair of holes left after the removal of corrosion damage
[21,22,27].
Fig. 14. Shear of a crack at a notch: (a) uniform crack face shear; (b) uniform remote shear.
Fig. 13. Comparison of Eq. (9) with the solution due to [12] for Cases 13.
A variety of approaches are now available for the design of composite repairs to cracks in thin metallic
skins, i.e. typical thickness less than $3 mm. The nite element alternating technique has proved to be very
useful for analysing this class of problems [21]. However, as discussed in the previous section, for small
cracks the mesh must be quite ne if free edge eects are to be captured.
One alternative design technique is based on the fact that the stress intensity factor for a patched crack
approaches a constant (limiting) value, dened as K
1
, as the crack length increases. This approach was
based on the premise that, for a suciently long crack in a structure which is subjected to a remote uniform
stress eld, the central region of the patch, over the crack, behaves like an overlap joint [23,24]. From this
premise it follows that the stress distribution in this central region and the stress intensity factor should
become independent of crack length.
As a result of this analogy it has been found that the problem of a bonded symmetric lap joint can be
used in the initial design process. Indeed, the resultant analytical formulae are particularly easy to use and
provide a rst estimate for the patch design.
It is possible, see Ref. [19,29], to increase the accuracy of these formulae [23] by (partially) accounting for
through-the-thickness eects and to allow for repairs to rib stiened panels. To this end the value of K
1
,
for the case when bending is prohibited, can be approximated, see Ref. [19] for details, by the formulae;
K
1
Y
L
o
O
l
p
10
where o
O
, which is the stress in the skin under the patch, is given by
o
O
oE
p
t
p
,E
p
t
p
E
r
t
r
11
Fig. 17. Comparison of solutions for Cases 11 and 12.
Table 3
Selected applications of composite repair technology, from Ref. [17]
Cracking Material Component Aircraft Comment
Stress-corrosion 7075-T6 Wing plank Hercules >300 repairs
Fatigue Mg alloy Landing wheel Macchi Life doubled
Fatigue 2024-T3 Fin skin Mirage Item was in-service from
1978 until retirement
Fatigue 2024-T3 Lower wing skin crack Mirage Item was in-service from late/mid 1970s until retirement
Fatigue D6ac steel Upper wing pivot tting F111C Repair installed on RAAF eet. No crack growth since
installation
Flight
demonstrator
Al 2024-T3 Fuselage lap splice,
wing leading edge,
trailing edge ap etc.
Boeing 747 Over 37,000 ight hours and 7020
landings over 10 years with no durability problems.
Y is a geometry factor, which accounts for repairs to centre or edge cracks;
Y 1 for a repair to a centre crack
0.9 for a repair to an edge crack
12
and
L
is the load attraction factor. For long uni-directional bre patches it has been found [19] that the
term
L
can be approximated as follows
3,81.,1 XE
r
t
r
,B E
p
t
p
E
p
t
p
,E
r
t
r
E
p
t
p
13
L
E
p
t
p
,E
r
t
r
E
p
t
p
14
l
E
p
t
p
,b1 t
p
E
p
,E
r
t
r
p
15
and
b t
a
,G
a
t
r
,3G
r
t
p
,3G
p
,t
a
,G
a
3t
r
,8G
r
3t
p
,8G
p
2
16
Here X is the width of the patch, B is the width of the plate/skin, t
a
, t
p
and t
r
are the thickness of the
adhesive, plate, and patch respectively, G and E denote the shear and Youngs modulus and the subscripts
a, p and r denote their values for the adhesive, plate, and patch respectively.
These formulae have been validated by comparison with more than 2000 fully 3-D nite element test
cases and by an extensive laboratory fatigue test program, see Refs. [19,29].
In recent years Wang and Rose [25] presented an alternative formulation together with a simple formulae
which accounted for a nite size crack. The formulae presented in [25] can be written in the following
simplied form:
K WllK 17
where, as before, K is the solution to an embedded aw acted upon by the same stress eld as exists under
the patch, and W describes the transition from the small crack solution l!0 to the long crack solution
l!1. Here l is the half length of the crack.
Wl,l
p
1 2.23 l,l,1 4.77 l,l 7l,l
2

18
The problem of composite repairs to cracks at a hole or notch was rst studied by Baker et al. [26], which
deals with repairs to cracks a fuel decant hole in Mirage III aircraft, and later by Atluri et al. [21]. For this
problem as the crack length l!1 the solution should approach that of a patched crack without a hole.
Hence when l/, is large, the stress intensity factor should tend to an asymptotic value K
1
, which is inde-
pendent of the size of hole. As a result we can present an approximate solution, for the problem of a
composite repair to a cracked hole subjected to a remote uniform stress eld, in the form, viz:
K F l,, W l,2l K 19
Since K is the starting solution in the nite element alternating solution this formulation can be thought
of as a marriage of the alternating solution [1,2,21] and the method of Rose [23,25].
This solution has the correct lower and upper bounds for the stress intensity factor at a cracked hole
repaired with an externally bonded composite patch.
To illustrate the ease of application of this solution let us consider the case of a crack of length l ema-
nating from a hole with a radius R of 3 mm, this size was chosen to represent a typical fastener hole, in an
innite aluminium alloy plate (skin) subjected to a uniform remote stress of 100 MPa. The plate is repaired
using a uni-directional boron epoxy patch that covers its entire width. The patch also contains a 3 mm
radius hole and the bres are orientated perpendicular to the crack, i.e. in the direction of the load. The
moduli of the aluminium skin (plate) are E=72,000 MPa and v=0.33. The patch was assumed to have the
following mechanical properties: E
11
=208,000 MPa, E
22
=E
33
=25,432 MPa, n
12
=0.183, and G
12
=G
13
=
G
23
=7241 MPa. The adhesive was taken to be FM73 and was 0.2 mm, i.e. two layers, thick with a shear
modulus of 750 MPa and v=0.35.
Two dierent plate and patch thicknesses were considered:
Case i: a plate thickness of 1.2 mm and a patch thickness of 0.52 mm, i.e. approximately four plies thick.
Case ii: a plate thickness of 3 mm and a patch thickness of 0.889 mm, i.e. approximately seven plies thick.
The rst case was chosen to approximate a crack at a fastener hole in the fuselage skin of a wide-bodied
transport aircraft. The second case was chosen to approximate a crack at a fastener hole in the wing skin of
a military ghter aircraft. In each case the patch thickness was chosen to approximate the stiness, i.e. the
product of the modulus and the thickness, of the plate (skin). The resultant stress intensity factors are
presented in Fig. 18.
The steps taken in obtaining this solution were:
(a) rst treat the patch and the un-cracked plate as a (balanced) composite laminate and obtain the
stress distribution at the hole using the solution given in [28].
(b) use this solution to estimate the strain, and hence the stress, state in the un-cracked plate with a
patch.
(c) having obtained the stress distribution in the plate calculate K.
(d) compute the stress intensity factor for the patched crack.
When performing fatigue life calculations it is tempting to only consider the stress eld acting perpen-
dicular to crack. For small cracks at holes this simplication can lead to erroneous results. This is because
the load bia-xiality ratio can have a signicant eect on K, see Fig. 13. Consequently, when designing
repairs to cracked holes [21,22,26], or to cut outs resulting from the removal of corroded material [27], load
bi-axiality needs to be considered. This eect is discussed in more detail in [4].
4. Application to fatigue crack growth analysis
The fatigue life of a structure is frequently dominated by the time taken for the (critical) crack to grow from
a small initial aw to a length comparable to the radius of curvature associated with the local structural
detail, see the curve AB in Fig. 19 which deals with crack growth data for Boeing 737 and 727 aircraft [30].
The same phenomenon is often true for military aircraft. For example, let us consider cracking in stif-
fener number 2 on the upper wing pivot tting of F111 aircraft. A typical geometry conguration for the
wing is:
Plate thickness: 7.35 mm
Maximum stiener depth: 49.02 mm
Minimum stiener depth: 9.37 mm
Stiener width: 5.00 mm.
Fig. 18. Composite repairs to cracked holes.
Fig. 19. Fleet crack growth data for B-737 and B-727 aircraft, from Ref. [30].
In this case the initial crack size in the stiener runout was estimated to be less than 0.1 mm and the limit
set for cracks found in service aircraft was 2 mm, see [31].
From this it follows that for realistic problems, with complex shapes and boundaries under complex
loads, we need to accurately compute K for short and medium length cracks, i.e. where l/, is o(1), and have
a greater tolerance for approximate solutions for longer cracks where l/, is large.
In previous sections we have mentioned that the nite element alternating solution is a useful tool for
calculating the stress intensity factors associated with cracked structural components. The basic steps in the
nite-element alternating technique are:
(i) A standard nite-element analysis is performed to analyse the un-cracked nite body under the
prescribed external loads. The geometry of the un-cracked body used here is identical to that of the
cracked body except for the presence of the crack itself, i.e the crack is not modelled.
(ii) As the crack is not explicitly modelled, non-zero stresses are calculated at the location of the actual
crack, see Fig. 20. These ctitious stresses must be removed in order to create the traction free crack
surface that exists in the problem under consideration.
(iii) The analytical solution for an embedded crack subjected to an arbitrary distribution of tractions on
the crack face is now used. To create the required stress-free crack face the stresses determined in
(ii), at the location of the crack faces, are now reversed and a polynomial representation is obtained
using a least squares t. For cracks at a free edge, or a notch, the crack is mirrored across the
boundary of the notch to create a ctitious crack of equal length and the stress eld is also mirrored
across the boundary of the notch, see Fig. 2. These crack face stresses are then used together with
the analytical solution, for the innite geometry crack problem, to calculate the associated stress
intensity factor K.
(iv) the stresses on the boundary surfaces of the nite body due to these applied loads on the crack faces are
now calculated using both (iii) and the innite body solution for this (ctitious) embedded crack. These
boundary stresses are then reversed and applied as external loads on the original un-cracked body.
(v) this addition to the external loads again creates new ctitious stresses at the location of the crack
which must once again be removed to obtain the stress-free crack faces in the actual conguration.
All of the steps (i)(v) in the iteration process described above are repeated until the residual stresses on
the external boundary are reduced below a user dened tolerance.
The overall stress-intensity factor solution is then obtained by summing the stress-intensity factor solu-
tions for all iterations.
For problems where the external boundary is remote from the notch the present paper indicates that we
can use the solution for K obtained in step (iii) in the rst iteration to calculate the stress intensity factors
for a crack at the notch. This approach thereby removes the necessity to perform the subsequent iterations.
This approximation is particularly useful for those problems where the fatigue life is dominated by the time
required to grow from a small to a medium size, i.e. where l/, is o(1), crack. Such cases frequently occur,
i.e. crack growth in the F111 stiener runout and at fastener holes in a wide bodied transport aircraft.
This modication has several attractive features:
(i) a coarse mesh can be used when analysing small cracks at notches;
(ii) the fracture mechanics analysis and the nite element analysis can be decoupled and preformed
using dierent computer codes;
(iii) as a result of (ii) above the formulation can be coupled with standard fatigue life computer codes.
This approach is illustrated by considering the Cases 5, 6, 7 and 8 described previously, which corre-
spond to a crack at the root of a 2:1, or a 1:2 elliptical notch in an sheet under mode I loading. In these
studies the notches were considered to be 2010 mm and 1020 mm respectively and were centrally loca-
ted in a 400mm400mm sheet. The mesh(es) used in this study consisted of approximately 520 eight noded
iso-parametric elements and 1600 nodes. For Cases 5 and 6 the resultant normalised solutions, divided by
o
0
p
l where o
0
is the net section stress, are shown in Figs. 10 and 11, as triangular data points, where they
are labelled as nite element. The resultant solutions for Cases 7 and 8 are shown in Fig. 12 and are
labelled Eq. (9) and nite element stress. The approach is further illustrated via Cases 11 and 12, which
correspond to a crack at the root of a 2:1 and a 1:2 elliptical notch in an innite sheet under remote shear
loading. The resultant solutions for these cases are presented in Fig. 16 where they are also labelled Eq.
(9) and nite element stress. In all cases the agreement with other known solutions is very good.
5. Conclusion
This paper presents a simple method for calculating the stress intensity factors for cracks emanating
from a notch under arbitrary loading. A range of examples have been presented to demonstrate the accu-
racy of the present method.
This nding has the potential to be used in conjunction with the nite element alternating technique
[2,3,21] for the analysis of small to medium length cracks. Existing formulations use the solution for an
embedded aw. Consequently, when using the nite element alternating technique to analyse cracks at
notches we nd that if the crack is small we need to have a ne mesh around the notch. This requirement
is necessary to ensure that the boundary conditions are satised at the notch. However, if we adopt
the present approximation it may be possible to relax this requirement and thereby further increase the
computational attractiveness of this technique.
Fig. 20. First iteration of the FEAT.
It also has the potential to be used for problems associated with fatigue life extension and shape opti-
misation. To this end we have used the present approximation to develop an approximate solution for an
edge crack at a hole repaired with a bonded composite repair.
Acknowledgements
This work was done under funding from DSTO as part of the DSTO Centre of Excellence in Structural
Mechanics and from the Victorian State Government VPAC scheme. The authors wish to acknowledge the
discussions with Dr. M. Heller and Dr. S. Pitt at DSTO. The authors also wish to acknowledge the assis-
tance of Dr. A. Kotousov, at Monash, in providing the solution to the problem of a crack at an elliptical
notch under shear loading. The authors also wish to acknowledge the support of Noran Engineering, the
distributor of NE-NASTRAN, for their assistance in combining this formulation with NE-NASTRAN.
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A Simple Method For Computing The Stress Intensity Factors For Cracks at Notches

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