Surface crack in tension or in bending - A reassessment of the Newman and Raju formula in respect to fracture toughness measurements in brittle materials

The Newman and Raju formula for the stress intensity factor of a semi-elliptical surface crack loaded in uniaxial tension or in bending has been developed about 30 years ago using an FE-analysis for several geometric parameters and fitting an empirical equation to the data points. The Poisson's ratio analyzed was 0.3. In this paper a reassessment of the Newman and Raju formula is made, where all relevant geometric parameters of crack and specimen and the Poisson's ratio are considered. The deviations of the old formula from the new results are up to 21%, if the full range of Poisson's ratio is taken into account. Furthermore the influence of the crack-surface intersection angle is discussed. The results of this work are important for more precise fracture toughness measurements in brittle materials and give a practical guidance for appropriate specimen preparation for fracture toughness measurements, which is also considered here. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.