Journal of the American Ceramic Society, Vol.92, No.5, 1093-1097, 2009
Analytical Approaches to Stress Intensity Factor Evaluation for Indentation Cracks
In the present paper, an analytical solution for the stress intensity factor in the case of cracks produced by Vickers indenters has been extended to the cases of triangular indenters, i.e., Berkovich and cube-corner. According to the adopted approach, median/radial cracks produced by indentations are modeled as loaded by either a point-force or a symmetric disk-shaped wedge. The wedge diameter is assumed to be equal to the plastic zone size whereas the wedge thickness is evaluated by comparing the wedge volume with the hardness-impression volume. The point-force and the disk-shaped wedge analyses produce an upper and a lower bound, respectively, of the geometry-dependent parameter appearing in the expression for the fracture toughness. The predictions of the present analysis are in good agreement with similar experimental and numerical results.