ASA 128th Meeting - Austin, Texas - 1994 Nov 28 .. Dec 02

1pPA11. Observation of individual bond breaking events in precursors, cascades, etc. in the onset and progression of fracture.

Tianming Zhang

S. R. Savitski

J. D. Maynard

Dept. of Phys., Penn State Univ., University Park, PA 16802

Experimental measurements of fracture have been made using a wide bandwidth (10 MHz) transducer and a system with a relatively large bond size, with the result that one is able to observe individual bond breaking events. The data provide a direct test of ``fuse'' models [L. de Arcangelis, S. Redner, and H. J. Herrmann, J. Phys. Lett. (Paris) 46, L585 (1985)] and scaling theories of brittle fracture. Measurements have been made with uniform tensile stress and bending stress, with the latter corresponding to a phase transition in the presence of an external field. For samples of the same width, the observations are quite consistent, showing the effects of precursors, onset, progression, stress waves, crack arrest, and other interesting phenomena. A significant difference in precursors for the uniform and bending stress fields is observed, perhaps a result of the dimensionality of the maximum stress field. [Work supported by NSF Grant No. DMR-9306791 and by ONR.]

All posters will be on display from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. To allow contributors an opportunity to see other posters, contributors of odd-numbered papers will be at their posters from 1:00 to 3:00 p.m. and contributors of even-numbered papers will be at their posters from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. Posters will remain on display until 12:00 noon on Tuesday.