CONSISTENCY BETWEEN INDEPENDENCE THEOREMS AND GENERALIZED SELF-CONSISTENT METHOD

Recently Zheng & Hwang established a series of independence theorems c oncerning with planar effective elastic properties. It is manifested t hat the estimation of the effective elastic properties of microcracked solids through the generalized self-consistent method (GSCM) contradi cts with these independence theorems. In this paper it is shown that s uch contradiction is actually caused by the approximate algorithm adop ted, while the exact solution of GSCM is consistent with these rigorou sly established independence theorems. Since only an approximate algor ithm in GCSM is available in dealing with problems involving non-circu lar inclusions or holes, an intrinsic GSCM is proposed, which can be p erformed based on an approximate algorithm and the corresponding estim ations are consistent with the independence theorems.