Fracture-Mechanics Behaviour of Ceramic Foam with Macroscopic Stress Concentrator upon the Tensile Test

The work investigates an influence of the macroscopic stress concentrator inside the ceramic open cell foam structure on the fracture-mechanics response of the foam upon the tensile test. As the concentrator, the central crack/rectangular notch was taken into account. The influence of the crack/notch length and width on the stress concentration ahead the concentrator tip was assessed using the simplified FE beam element based model with irregular cells simulating the real ceramic foam structure. Average principal stresses calculated on set of struts ahead the crack/notch tip were compared with average stresses in the intact structure. It was found that the ratio of these stresses increases linearly with the crack length. The stress concentration ratio is slightly lower in case of thick rectangular notch than in case of a thin crack. Furthermore, the failure load leading to complete fracture of the studied specimens, subjected to the tensile loading, were calculated using the same model. It is shown that the difference factor between the critical fracture force in case of structure without concentrator and with concentrator is very close to the concentration factor calculated from the average stresses on particular struts in the region in front of the concentrator tip.