Plates and shells with cracks: A collection of stress intensity factor solutions for cracks in plates and shells (Mechanics of Fracture (3))

This third volume of a series on Mechanies of Fraeture deals with eraeks in plates and shelIs. It was noted in Volume 2 on three-dimensional eraek problems that additional free surfaees can lead to substantial mathematical complexities, often making the analysis unmanageable. The theory of plates and shelIs forms a part of the theory of elasticity in which eertain physieal assumptions are made on the basis that the distanee between two bounded surfaees, either fiat or eurved, is small in eomparison with the overall dimen sions of the body. In modern times, the broad and frequent applieations of plate- and shell-like struetural members have aeted as a stimulus to whieh engineers and researchers in the field of fracture meehanies have responded with a wide variety of solutions of teehnieal importanee. These eontributions are covered in this book so that the reader may gain an understanding of how analytieal treat me nt s ofplates and shells containing initial imperfeetions in the form of eraeks are earried out. The development of plate and shell theories has involved long standing controversy on the eonsisteney of omitting eertain small terms and at the same time retaining others of the same order of magnitude. This defieieney depends on the ratio of the plate or shell thiekness, h, to other eharaeteristie dimensions and eannot be eompletely resolved in view of the approximations inherent in the transverse dependence of the extensional and bending stresses Front Matter....Pages I-XLVIII Interaction of arbitrary array of cracks in wide plates under classical bending....Pages 1-43 Improved approximate theories of the bending and extension of flat plates....Pages 45-83 Through cracks in multilayered plates....Pages 85-115 Asymptotic approximations to crack problems in shells....Pages 117-160 Crack problems in cylindrical and spherical shells....Pages 161-199 On cracks in shells with shear deformation....Pages 201-229 Dynamic analysis of cracked plates in bending and extension....Pages 231-272 A specialized finite element approach for three-dimensional crack problems....Pages 273-298 Back Matter....Pages 299-302