The electroelastic response of an edge crack emanating from a free straight boundary of a semi-infinite plate made of piezoelectric ceramics such as lead zirconate titanate (PZT) and barium titanium oxide (BaTio3) under far-field tension parallel to free edge is discussed when the poling axis is perpendicular to the free edge. The analysis is carried out based on the body force method which is an indirect boundary element method for general purpose stress analysis. The crack site is modeled by a continuously embedded body force and electric charge doublets in an infinite and a semi-infinite piezoelectric plate. The body force doublets compensate the relative displacement between the upper and the lower crack faces while the electric charge doublets are introduced to express the electric field between the upper and the lower crack faces. The crack tip stress and electric displacement intensity factor can be estimated accurately by defining a proper basic density function suitable for piezoelectric line crack problems. The determination of the basic density function for an electroelastic crack problem is stated in detail by introducing a classical technique based on complex variables and Lekhnitskii formalism.
SAIMOTO et al. (2026) studied this question.