Numerical Analysis of Brazilian Disc Test with a Central Notch: Constrain Level for Various Notch Inclination Angles

Abstract

The Brazilian disc test is widely used to determinate indirect tensile strength or fracture mechanical parameters of rocks, concrete and polymers. The fracture mechanical parameters evaluated from such a test provides information of mode I, mode II and mixed mode I/II fracture initiation. While the geometry functions for calculation of stress intensity factors are known, the Tstress values are lacking. Especially, the lack of T-stress can be noticed, when the T-stress equals to zero. This contribution aims to find crack inclination angle for which the T-stress values are close to zero and evaluate stress intensity factor for such an angle. For this, a numerical study was performed.