Fatigue crack growth under large scale yielding condition: a tool based on explicit crack growth

Fatigue crack growth under large-scale yielding condition is studied for high-temperature loading. The applied strains are so important that diffuse damage phenomena are visible as a network of micro-cracks in front of the major crack. The survey of a macroscopic cracked surface is nevertheless possible, and numerical simulations with explicit representation of this crack are carried out to evaluate crack driving forces. The proposed numerical scheme takes into account plastic wake in the course of crack growth in a 3D model. A non-local model of fatigue crack growth rate, based on partition of strain energy density into elastic and plastic terms, yields improved results as compared to classical assessment of ∆J by numerical methods.