STATISTICAL FORMULATION AND EXPERIMENTAL-DETERMINATION OF GROWTH-RATEOF MICROMETER CRACKS UNDER IMPACT LOADING

A new statistical formulation and a relevant experimental approach to determine the growth rate of microcracks were proposed. The method con sists of experimental measurements and a statistical analysis' on the basis of the conservation law of number density of microcracks in phas e space. As a practical example of the method, the growth rate of micr ocracks appearing in an aluminium alloy subjected to planar impact loa ding was determined to be ca. 10 mu m/mu s under a tensile stress of 1 470 MPa and load duration between 0.26 mu s and 0.80 mu s. (C) 1997 El sevier Science Ltd.