DentMaterll:ill-112,

March,1995

Fracture mechanics principles

John J. Mecholsky, Jr.

Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA

ABSTRACT considered a measure of the toughness of the material.

Irwin (1957) further recommended that standardized tests
The principles of linear elastic fracture mechanics (LEFM) were devel- beperformed which can measure the critical stress inten-
oped in the 1950s by George Irwin (1957). This work was based on sity factor for different materials. From this work, and
previous investigations of Griffith (1920) and Orowan (1944). Irwin through the work of many other investigators (ASTM,
(1957) demonstrated that a crack shape in a particular location with 1984a; Benchmark Committee, 1989), a compilation of
respect to the loading geometry had a stress intensity associated with several standardized tests for determining K,, values for
it. He also demonstrated the equivalence between the stress intensity metals are available from ASTM (198413).Toughness can
concept and the familiar Griffith criterion of failure. More importantly, he be measured by either the critical stress intensity factor,
described the systematic and controlled evaluation of the toughness of Krc, fracture energy, y,, or critical strain energy release
a material. Toughness is defined as the resistance of a material to rapid rate, G, (G, = 2~). Note that K,, is measured in units of
crack propagation and can be characterized by one parameter, K,,. In stress-(distance)ln, e.g., MPa rnln, and yc and G, are
??

contrast, the strength of a material is dependent on the size of the measured in energy/unit area, e.g., J/m”.
initiating crack present in that particular sample or component. The For the purposes of this paper in the application of
fracture toughness of a material is generally independent of the size of fracture mechanics, we will only consider brittle materi-
the initiating crack. The strength of any product is limited by the size of als, such as ceramics, glass, glass ceramics, and brittle
the cracks or defects during processing, production and handling. Thus, polymers, and materials with limited ductility, i.e., local
the application of fracture mechanics principles to dental biomaterials is plastic deformation at or near the crack tip, such as metals
invaluable in new material development, production control and failure and some polymers. Global yielding is governed by plastic
analysis. This paper describes the most useful equations of fracture deformation and is limited by the yield stress.
mechanics to be used in the failure analysis of dental biomaterials. For small elliptical surface cracks in brittle materials,
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND i.e., cracks whose depths are less than -0.25 times the
thickness and with no local residual stress, Eqs. 1 and 2 can
Complex loading on pre-existing cracks can be resolved be reduced to:
into three modes. If the loading is tensile, it is referred to K,, =1.240&i (3)
as Mode I; if it is in-plane shear, Mode II; and out-of-plane where @ = 1.57 (from Eq. 1) for a semi-circular crack and
shear (or torsion), is referred to as Mode III (Jayatilaka, c is the radius of an equivalent semi-circular crack for a
1979). Most brittle materials fail in Mode I. If two materi- semi-elliptical crack of semi-minor axis a and semi-major
als arejoined, but still fail primarily in a tensile mode, then axis b. For most applications offailure in brittle materials,
the original crack exhibits a mixed mode condition com- this is an extremely useful approximation.
bining Modes I & II. Most of the cases with which we will For materials with limited ductility, Eqs. 1 and 2 have
be concerned will be Mode I. The Mode I stress intensity, to be modified: 11 I-Z
K,, of a crack in a material can be determined, in general,
K,f = .!+!!&&
using the relationship: _ Q
I.IJlt
K, =[-]o& where Q =@’ - 0.212 [o/oy I2and Keflisthe value ofK,c with
@ local plastic deformation at the crack tip. An estimate of
K, =[Y(O)]o& (lb) the effect of local plasticity can be obtained from an
evaluation of the second term in Q with respect to (D*.The
where Y(O) is a geometrical factor which accounts for the value of @varies from 1 to 1.57 for cracks with aspect ratios
location and geometry of the crack and loading (Randall, (a/b) ranging from 0 to 1, respectively. Obviously, the yield
19671 and 0 is the angle from the surface to a point stress for the material, oy, has to be known or determined
anywhere along the crack periphery, @ is a flaw shape for this analysis.
parameter,0 is the applied stress, a is the semi-minor axis, Toughening mechanisms that increase the resistance
and b the semi-major axis of an elliptical crack. K1in this to crack growth with crack size do not necessarily invali-
case is a measure of the effect of loading on a crack of a date the test, but rather provide a multi-valued property
given geometry. As the load increases, the stress intensity (Broek, 1986). These latter materials have been termed “R-
increases. Irwin (1957) defined failure at the point when curve” or “T-curve”materials (Cook et al., 1985). It appears
K1reaches a critical value, i.e., fracture occurs when: that this type of behavior is common in tougher materials.
K, 2 K,C = [Y(O)] o&i (2) The name “R-curve” does not identify the toughening
where K,, is in many cases a material constant and is mechanism. Thus, if brittle or ductile materials exhibit

Dental Materials/March 1995 111

R-curve behavior, then the mechanism for this behavior behavior controls the apparent global behavior of the
should be identified to take advantage of any further material. Thus, it is critical to material development that
toughening. the fracture toughness be properly obtained. To character-
TESTING PROCEDURES ize fracture toughness completely, both large and small
crack techniques should be used. The test that matches
Strength alone will not provide sufficient information to the conditions of the particular application will prove to be
decide whether or not a treatment process has enhanced the most reliable in predicting behavior.
the resistance to fast fracture. Since strength is depen-
dent on crack size, it can vary with the handling proce- Presented at the 1994 ADM annual meeting, Bermuda, November 1994.
dure, finishing procedure or with random processing See following paper for corresponding author’s address.
flaws. Various strength tests are used in the literature.
These include the diametral compression test (Shetty et REFERENCES
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112 Mecholsky/Fracture mechanics principles