INTERFACE CRACK PROBLEMS IN LAYERED ORTHOTROPIC MATERIALS

THE PRIMARY objective of this paper is to study the influence of the s tructure and thickness of the interfacial regions on the strain energy release rate in bonded isotropic or orthotropic materials containing collinear interface cracks. The problem is formulated in terms of a sy stem of singular integral equations of the second kind which is solved by using a relatively simple and efficient technique. A number of exa mples are given for various crack geometries and material combinations . The results show that the effect of the properties and the relative thickness of the interfacial region on the stress intensity factors an d the strain energy release rate can be highly significant.