Investigation of stress states around a finite-height crack

This paper is concerned with the analysis of a crack that has a finite-height at its crack tip, loaded under Mode I and II loading. The stress field around the "crack-height"region has been analysed and local Williams' eigensolutions collocated using the H-integral. Results of the analysis help us to predict which one of the three possible places that fracture failure could occur is most likely, i.e., (1) at the middle plane of the crack tip (collinear with the sharp crack problem), (2) at the "notch corner"or (3) at the intermediate plane between the notch corner and the middle plane (intermediate state). A practical example of an infinite plane with a rectangular shaped crack has also been shown to demonstrate the practical use of the results of this paper.