THE METHOD OF ANALYSIS OF CRACKS IN 3-DIMENSIONAL TRANSVERSELY ISOTROPIC MEDIA - BOUNDARY INTEGRAL-EQUATION APPROACH

The fundamental solutions are obtained for a unit-concentrated displac ement discontinuity in a three-dimensional transversely isotropic medi um. The method of solution involves reducing the problem to a system o f hyper-singular integral equations by application of these fundamenta l solutions. The near crack border elastic displacement and stress are obtained. Stress intensity factors can be expressed in terms of the d isplacement discontinuity on the crack surface. Analogy is established between the boundary integral equations for arbitrarily shaped cracks in a transversely isotropic and elastic medium such that once the str ess intensity factors in the transversely isotropic medium can be dete rmined directly from that of the isotropic elastic medium. Results for the penny-shaped crack are obtained as an example. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.