Quasi Static Analysis of Anti-Plane Shear Crack

Fracture mechanics has been revisited by proposing different models of quasi static brittle fracture. In this work, the problem of the quasi static crack propagation is based on variational approach. It requires no prior knowledge of the crack path or of its topology. Moreover, it is capable of modeling crack initiation. In the numerical experiments, we use a standard linear (P1) Lagrange finite element method for discretization. We perform numerical simulations of a piece of brittle material without initial crack. An alternate minimizations algorithm is used. Based on these numerical results, we determine the influence of numerical parameters on the evolution of energies and crack propagation. We show also the necessity of considering the kinetic term and the crack propagation becomes dynamic.