Statistical analysis of fracture toughness of soda-lime glass determined by indentation

Vickers indentation tests were conducted on a commercial soda-lime glass to determine the fracture toughness. The resultant fracture toughness data were then analyzed statistically. It was found that there always exists a somewhat large scatter in the indentation toughness measured at each applied load level. The variability of the measured indentation toughness was modeled by the well-known Weibull statistics. For different sets of indentation toughness data measured at different load levels, the resultant Weibull moduli are nearly identical with each other: indicating that the statistical variability of the indentation toughness is load-independent. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.