Mechanisms for kink band evolution in polymer matrix composites: a digital image correlation and finite element study

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Polymer matrix composites (PMCs) are attractive structural materials due to their high stiffness to low weight ratio. However, unidirectional PMCs have low shear strength and failure can occur along kink bands that develop on compression due to plastic microbuckling that…

Polymer matrix composites (PMCs) are attractive structural materials due to their high stiffness to low weight ratio. However, unidirectional PMCs have low shear strength and failure can occur along kink bands that develop on compression due to plastic microbuckling that carry strains large enough to induce nonlinear matrix deformation. Reviewing the literature, a large fraction of the existing work is for uniaxial compression, and the effects of stress gradients, such as those present during bending, have not been as well explored, and these effects are bound to make difference in terms of kink band nucleation and growth. Furthermore, reports on experimental measurements of strain fields leading to and developing inside these bands in the presence of stress gradients are also scarce and need to be addressed to gain a full understanding of their behavior when UDCs are used under bending and other spatially complex stress states.

In a light to bridge the aforementioned gaps, the primary focus of this work is to understand mechanisms for kink band evolution under an influence of stress-gradients induced during bending. Digital image correlation (DIC) is used to measure strains inside and around the kink bands during 3-point bending of samples with 0°/90° stacking made of Ultra-High Molecular Weight Polyethylene Fibers. Measurements indicate bands nucleate at the compression side and propagate into the sample carrying a mixture of large shear and normal strains (~33%), while also decreasing its bending stiffness. Failure was produced by a combination of plastic microbuckling and axial splitting. The microstructure of the kink bands was studied and used in a microstructurally explicit finite element model (FEM) to analyze stresses and strains at ply level in the samples during kink band evolution, using cohesive zone elements to represent the interfaces between plies. Cohesive element properties were deduced by a combination of delamination, fracture and three-point bending tests used to calibrate the FEMs. Modeling results show that the band morphology is sensitive to the shear and opening properties of the interfaces between the plies.
Date Created
2016
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Effects of dynamic material strength on hydrodynamic instability and damage evolution in shock loaded copper

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Characterization and modeling of deformation and failure in metallic materials under extreme conditions, such as the high loads and strain rates found under shock loading due to explosive detonation and high velocity-impacts, are extremely important for a wide variety of…

Characterization and modeling of deformation and failure in metallic materials under extreme conditions, such as the high loads and strain rates found under shock loading due to explosive detonation and high velocity-impacts, are extremely important for a wide variety of military and industrial applications. When a shock wave causes stress in a material that exceeds the elastic limit, plasticity and eventually spallation occur in the material. The process of spall fracture, which in ductile materials stems from strain localization, void nucleation, growth and coalescence, can be caused by microstructural heterogeneity. The analysis of void nucleation performed from a microstructurally explicit simulation of a spall damage evolution in a multicrystalline copper indicated triple junctions as the preferred sites for incipient damage nucleation revealing 75% of them with at least two grain boundaries with misorientation angle between 20-55°. The analysis suggested the nature of the boundaries connecting at a triple junction is an indicator of their tendency to localize spall damage. The results also showed that damage propagated preferentially into one of the high angle boundaries after voids nucleate at triple junctions. Recently the Rayleigh-Taylor Instability (RTI) and the Richtmyer-Meshkov Instability (RMI) have been used to deduce dynamic material strength at very high pressures and strain rates. The RMI is used in this work since it allows using precise diagnostics such as Transient Imaging Displacement Interferometry (TIDI) due to its slower linear growth rate. The Preston-Tonks-Wallace (PTW) model is used to study the effects of dynamic strength on the behavior of samples with a fed-thru RMI, induced via direct laser drive on a perturbed surface, on stability of the shock front and the dynamic evolution of the amplitudes and velocities of the perturbation imprinted on the back (flat) surface by the perturbed shock front. Simulation results clearly showed that the amplitude of the hydrodynamic instability increases with a decrease in strength and vice versa and that the amplitude of the perturbed shock front produced by the fed-thru RMI is also affected by strength in the same way, which provides an alternative to amplitude measurements to study strength effects under dynamic conditions. Simulation results also indicate the presence of second harmonics in the surface perturbation after a certain time, which were also affected by the material strength.
Date Created
2016
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Finite element analysis of micro-cantilever beam experiments in UO2

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Description
Uranium Dioxide (UO2) is a significant nuclear fission fuel, which is widely used

in nuclear reactors. Understanding the influence of microstructure on thermo-mechanical behavior of UO2 is extremely important to predict its performance. In particular, evaluating mechanical properties, such as elasticity,…

Uranium Dioxide (UO2) is a significant nuclear fission fuel, which is widely used

in nuclear reactors. Understanding the influence of microstructure on thermo-mechanical behavior of UO2 is extremely important to predict its performance. In particular, evaluating mechanical properties, such as elasticity, plasticity and creep at sub-grain length scales is key to developing this understanding as well as building multi-scale models of fuel behavior with predicting capabilities. In this work, modeling techniques were developed to study effects of microstructure on Young’s modulus, which was selected as a key representative property that affects overall mechanical behavior, using experimental data obtained from micro-cantilever bending testing as benchmarks. Beam theory was firstly introduced to calculate Young's modulus of UO2 from the experimental data and then three-dimensional finite element models of the micro-cantilever beams were constructed to simulate bending tests in UO2 at room temperature. The influence of the pore distribution was studied to explain the discrepancy between predicted values and experimental results. Results indicate that results of tests are significantly affected by porosity given that both pore size and spacing in the samples are of the order of the micro-beam dimensions. Microstructure reconstruction was conducted with images collected from three-dimensional serial sectioning using focused ion beam (FIB) and electron backscattering diffraction (EBSD) and pore clusters were placed at different locations along the length of the beam. Results indicate that the presence of pore clusters close to the substrate, i.e., the clamp of the micro-cantilever beam, has the strongest effect on load-deflection behavior, leading to a reduction of stiffness that is the largest for any location of the pore cluster. Furthermore, it was also found from both numerical and i

analytical models that pore clusters located towards the middle of the span and close to the end of the beam only have a very small effect on the load-deflection behavior, and it is concluded that better estimates of Young's modulus can be obtained from micro- cantilever experiments by using microstructurally explicit models that account for porosity in about one half of the beam length close to the clamp. This, in turn, provides an avenue to simplify micro-scale experiments and their analysis.
Date Created
2015
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Efficient extended finite element algorithms for strongly and weakly discontinuous entities with complex internal geometries

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The objective of this research is to develop robust, accurate, and adaptive algorithms in the framework of the extended finite element method (XFEM) for fracture analysis of highly heterogeneous materials with complex internal geometries. A key contribution of this work…

The objective of this research is to develop robust, accurate, and adaptive algorithms in the framework of the extended finite element method (XFEM) for fracture analysis of highly heterogeneous materials with complex internal geometries. A key contribution of this work is the creation of novel methods designed to automate the incorporation of high-resolution data, e.g. from X-ray tomography, that can be used to better interpret the enormous volume of data generated in modern in-situ experimental testing. Thus new algorithms were developed for automating analysis of complex microstructures characterized by segmented tomographic images.

A centrality-based geometry segmentation algorithm was developed to accurately identify discrete inclusions and particles in composite materials where limitations in imaging resolution leads to spurious connections between particles in close contact.To allow for this algorithm to successfully segment geometry independently of particle size and shape, a relative centrality metric was defined to allow for a threshold centrality criterion for removal of voxels that spuriously connect distinct geometries.

To automate incorporation of microstructural information from high-resolution images, two methods were developed that initialize signed distance fields on adaptively-refined finite element meshes. The first method utilizes a level set evolution equation that is directly solved on the finite element mesh through Galerkins method. The evolution equation is formulated to produce a signed distance field that matches geometry defined by a set of voxels segmented from tomographic images. The method achieves optimal convergence for the order of elements used. In a second approach, the fast marching method is employed to initialize a distance field on a uniform grid which is then projected by least squares onto a finite element mesh. This latter approach is shown to be superior in speed and accuracy.

Lastly, extended finite element method simulations are performed for the analysis of particle fracture in metal matrix composites with realistic particle geometries initialized from X-ray tomographic data. In the simulations, particles fracture probabilistically through a Weibull strength distribution. The model is verified through comparisons with the experimentally-measured stress-strain response of the material as well as analysis of the fracture. Further, simulations are then performed to analyze the effect of mesh sensitivity, the effect of fracture of particles on their neighbors, and the role of a particles shape on its fracture probability.
Date Created
2015
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Microstructural characterization and corrosion behavior of Al 7075 alloys using X-ray synchrotron tomography

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Description
Al 7075 alloys are used in a variety of structural applications, such as aircraft wings, automotive components, fuselage, spacecraft, missiles, etc. The mechanical and corrosion behavior of these alloys are dependent on their microstructure and the environment. Therefore, a comprehensive…

Al 7075 alloys are used in a variety of structural applications, such as aircraft wings, automotive components, fuselage, spacecraft, missiles, etc. The mechanical and corrosion behavior of these alloys are dependent on their microstructure and the environment. Therefore, a comprehensive study on microstructural characterization and stress-environment interaction is necessary. Traditionally, 2D techniques have been used to characterize microstructure, which are inaccurate and inadequate since the research has shown that the results obtained in the bulk are different from those obtained on the surface. There now exist several techniques in 3D, which can be used to characterize the microstructure. Al 7075 alloys contain second phase particles which can be classified as Fe-bearing inclusions, Si-bearing inclusions and precipitates. The variation in mechanical and corrosion properties of aluminum alloys has been attributed to the size, shape, distribution, corrosion properties and mechanical behavior of these precipitates and constituent particles. Therefore, in order to understand the performance of Al 7075 alloys, it is critical to investigate the size and distribution of inclusions and precipitates in the alloys along with their mechanical properties, such as Young's modulus, hardness and stress-strain behavior. X-ray tomography and FIB tomography were used to visualize and quantify the microstructure of constituent particles (inclusions) and precipitates, respectively. Microscale mechanical characterization techniques, such as nanoindentation and micropillar compression, were used to obtain mechanical properties of inclusions. Over the years, studies have used surface measurements to understand corrosion behavior of materials. More recently, in situ mechanical testing has become more attractive and advantageous, as it enables visualization and quantification of microstructural changes as a function of time (4D). In this study, in situ X-ray synchrotron tomography was used to study the SCC behavior of Al 7075 alloys in moisture and deionized water. Furthermore, experiments were performed in EXCO solution to study the effect of applied stress on exfoliation behavior in 3D. Contrary to 2D measurements made at the surface which suggest non-uniform crack growth rates, three dimensional measurements of the crack length led to a much more accurate measurement of crack growth rates.
Date Created
2015
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Role of defects interactions with embrittlement species in iron: a multiscale perspective

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Hydrogen embrittlement (HE) is a phenomenon that affects both the physical and chemical properties of several intrinsically ductile metals. Consequently, understanding the mechanisms behind HE has been of particular interest in both experimental and modeling research. Discrepancies between experimental observations…

Hydrogen embrittlement (HE) is a phenomenon that affects both the physical and chemical properties of several intrinsically ductile metals. Consequently, understanding the mechanisms behind HE has been of particular interest in both experimental and modeling research. Discrepancies between experimental observations and modeling results have led to various proposals for HE mechanisms. Therefore, to gain insights into HE mechanisms in iron, this dissertation aims to investigate several key issues involving HE such as: a) the incipient crack tip events; b) the cohesive strength of grain boundaries (GBs); c) the dislocation-GB interactions and d) the dislocation mobility.

The crack tip, which presents a preferential trap site for hydrogen segregation, was examined using atomistic methods and the continuum based Rice-Thompson criterion as sufficient concentration of hydrogen can alter the crack tip deformation mechanism. Results suggest that there is a plausible co-existence of the adsorption induced dislocation emission and hydrogen enhanced decohesion mechanisms. In the case of GB-hydrogen interaction, we observed that the segregation of hydrogen along the interface leads to a reduction in cohesive strength resulting in intergranular failure. A methodology was further developed to quantify the role of the GB structure on this behavior.

GBs play a fundamental role in determining the strengthening mechanisms acting as an impediment to the dislocation motion; however, the presence of an unsurmountable barrier for a dislocation can generate slip localization that could further lead to intergranular crack initiation. It was found that the presence of hydrogen increases the strain energy stored within the GB which could lead to a transition in failure mode. Finally, in the case of body centered cubic metals, understanding the complex screw dislocation motion is critical to the development of an accurate continuum description of the plastic behavior. Further, the presence of hydrogen has been shown to drastically alter the plastic deformation, but the precise role of hydrogen is still unclear. Thus, the role of hydrogen on the dislocation mobility was examined using density functional theory and atomistic simulations. Overall, this dissertation provides a novel atomic-scale understanding of the HE mechanism and development of multiscale tools for future endeavors.
Date Created
2015
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A novel nonlocal lattice particle framework for modeling of solids

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Fracture phenomena have been extensively studied in the last several decades. Continuum mechanics-based approaches, such as finite element methods and extended finite element methods, are widely used for fracture simulation. One well-known issue of these approaches is the stress singularity…

Fracture phenomena have been extensively studied in the last several decades. Continuum mechanics-based approaches, such as finite element methods and extended finite element methods, are widely used for fracture simulation. One well-known issue of these approaches is the stress singularity resulted from the spatial discontinuity at the crack tip/front. The requirement of guiding criteria for various cracking behaviors, such as initiation, propagation, and branching, also poses some challenges. Comparing to the continuum based formulation, the discrete approaches, such as lattice spring method, discrete element method, and peridynamics, have certain advantages when modeling various fracture problems due to their intrinsic characteristics in modeling discontinuities.

A novel, alternative, and systematic framework based on a nonlocal lattice particle model is proposed in this study. The uniqueness of the proposed model is the inclusion of both pair-wise local and multi-body nonlocal potentials in the formulation. First, the basic ideas of the proposed framework for 2D isotropic solid are presented. Derivations for triangular and square lattice structure are discussed in detail. Both mechanical deformation and fracture process are simulated and model verification and validation are performed with existing analytical solutions and experimental observations. Following this, the extension to general 3D isotropic solids based on the proposed local and nonlocal potentials is given. Three cubic lattice structures are discussed in detail. Failure predictions using the 3D simulation are compared with experimental testing results and very good agreement is observed. Next, a lattice rotation scheme is proposed to account for the material orientation in modeling anisotropic solids. The consistency and difference compared to the classical material tangent stiffness transformation method are discussed in detail. The implicit and explicit solution methods for the proposed lattice particle model are also discussed. Finally, some conclusions and discussions based on the current study are drawn at the end.
Date Created
2015
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Three dimensional characterization of microstructural effects on spall damage in shocked polycrystalline copper

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Description
Shock loading is a complex phenomenon that can lead to failure mechanisms such as strain localization, void nucleation and growth, and eventually spall fracture. The length scale of damage with respect to that of the surrounding microstructure has proven to…

Shock loading is a complex phenomenon that can lead to failure mechanisms such as strain localization, void nucleation and growth, and eventually spall fracture. The length scale of damage with respect to that of the surrounding microstructure has proven to be a key aspect in determining sites of failure initiation. Studying incipient stages of spall damage is of paramount importance to accurately determine initiation sites in the material microstructure where damage will nucleate and grow and to formulate continuum models that account for the variability of the damage process due to microstructural heterogeneity, which is the focus of this research. Shock loading experiments were conducted via flyer-plate impact tests for pressures of 2-6 GPa and strain rates of 105/s on copper polycrystals of varying thermomechanical processing conditions. Serial cross sectioning of recovered target disks was performed along with electron microscopy, electron backscattering diffraction (EBSD), focused ion beam (FIB) milling, and 3-D X-ray tomogrpahy (XRT) to gain 2-D and 3-D information on the spall plane and surrounding microstructure. Statistics on grain boundaries (GB) containing damage were obtained from 2-D data and GBs of misorientations 25° and 50° were found to have the highest probability to contain damage in as-received (AR), heat treated (HT), and fully recrystallized (FR) microstructures, while {111} Σ3 GBs were globally strong. The AR microstructure’s probability peak was the most pronounced indicating GB strength is the dominant factor for damage nucleation. 3-D XRT data was used to digitally render the spall planes of the AR, HT, and FR microstructures. From shape fitting the voids to ellipsoids, it was found that the AR microstructure contained greater than 55% intergranular damage, whereas the HT and FR microstructures contained predominantly transgranular and coalesced damage modes, respectively. 3-D reconstructions of large volume damage sites in shocked Cu multicrystals showed preference for damage nucleation at GBs between adjacent grains of a high Taylor factor mismatches as well as an angle between the shock direction and the GB physical normal of ~30°-45°. 3-D FIB sectioning of individual voids led to the discovery of uniform plastic zones ~25-50% the size of the void diameter and plastic deformation directions were characterized via local average misorientation maps. Incipient transgranular voids revealed from the sectioning process were present in grains of high Taylor factors along the shock direction, which is expected as materials with a low Taylor factor along the shock direction are susceptible to growth due their accomodation of plastic deformation. Fabrication of square waves using photolithography and chemical etching was developed to study the nature of plasticity at GBs away from the spall plane. Grains oriented close to <0 1 1> had half the residual amplitudes than grains oriented close to <0 0 1>.
Date Created
2015
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The Role of Grain Boundary Structure and Crystal Orientation on Crack Growth Asymmetry in Aluminum

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Atomistic simulations have shown that the grain boundary (GB) structure affects a number of physical, mechanical, thermal, and chemical properties, which can have a profound effect on macroscopic properties of polycrystalline materials. The research objective herein is to use atomistic…

Atomistic simulations have shown that the grain boundary (GB) structure affects a number of physical, mechanical, thermal, and chemical properties, which can have a profound effect on macroscopic properties of polycrystalline materials. The research objective herein is to use atomistic simulations to explore the role that GB structure and the adjacent crystallographic orientations have on the directional asymmetry of an intergranular crack (i.e. cleavage behavior is favored along one direction, while ductile behavior along the other direction of the interface) for aluminum grain boundaries. Simulation results from seven 〈110〉 symmetric tilt grain boundaries (STGBs) show that the GB structure and the associated free volume directly influence the stress–strain response, crack growth rate, and crack tip plasticity mechanisms for middle-tension (M(T)) crack propagation specimens. In particular, the structural units present within the GB promote whether a dislocation or twinning-based mechanism operates at the crack tip during intergranular fracture along certain GBs (e.g., the ‘E’ structural unit promotes twinning at the crack tip in Al). Furthermore, the crystallography of the adjacent grains, and therefore the available slip planes, can significantly affect the crack growth rates in both directions of the crack – this creates a strong directional asymmetry in the crack growth rate in the Σ11 (113) and the Σ27 (552) STGBs. Upon comparing these results with the theoretical Rice criterion, it was found that certain GBs in this study (Σ9 (221), Σ11 (332) and Σ33 (441)) show an absence of directional asymmetry in the observed crack growth behavior, in conflict with the Rice criterion. The significance of the present research is that it provides a physical basis for the role of GB character and crystallographic orientation on intergranular crack tip deformation behavior.

Date Created
2014-11-17
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Atomic Scale Investigation of Grain Boundary Structure Role on Intergranular Deformation in Aluminium

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The role that grain boundary (GB) structure plays on the directional asymmetry of an intergranular crack (i.e. cleavage behaviour is favoured along one direction, while ductile behaviour along the other direction of the interface) was investigated using atomistic simulations for…

The role that grain boundary (GB) structure plays on the directional asymmetry of an intergranular crack (i.e. cleavage behaviour is favoured along one direction, while ductile behaviour along the other direction of the interface) was investigated using atomistic simulations for aluminium 〈1 1 0〉 symmetric tilt GBs. Middle-tension (M(T)) and Mode-I crack propagation specimens were used to evaluate the predictive capability of the Rice criterion. The stress–strain response of the GBs for the M(T) specimens highlighted the importance of the GB structure. The observed crack tip behaviour for certain GBs (Σ9 (2 2 1), Σ11 (3 3 2) and Σ33 (4 4 1)) with the M(T) specimen displayed an absence of directional asymmetry which is in disagreement with the Rice criterion. Moreover, in these GBs with the M(T) specimen, the dislocation emission from a GB source at a finite distance ahead of the crack tip was observed rather than from the crack tip, as suggested by the Rice criterion. In an attempt to understand discrepancy between the theoretical predictions and atomistic observations, the effect of boundary conditions (M(T), Mode-I and the edge crack) on the crack tip events was examined and it was concluded that the incipient plastic events observed were strongly influenced by the boundary conditions (i.e. activation of dislocation sources along the GB, in contrast to dislocation nucleation directly from the crack tip). In summary, these findings provide new insights into crack growth behaviour along GB interfaces and provide a physical basis for examining the role of the GB character on incipient event ahead of a crack tip and interface properties, as an input to higher scale models.

Date Created
2014-10-23
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