Crack Tip Parameters for Growing Cracks in Linear Viscoelastic Materials

In this paper the problem of describing the asymptotic fields around a slowly growing crack in a linearly viscoelastic material is considered. It is shown that for plane mixed mode problems the asymptotic fields must be described by 6 parameters: 2 stress intensity factors and 4 deformation intensity factors. In the special case of a constant Poisson ratio only 2 deformation intensity factors are needed. Closed form solutions are given both for a slowly growing crack and for a crack that is suddenly arrested at a point at the crack extension path. Two examples are studied; a stress boundary value problem, and a displacement boundary value problem. The results show that the stress intensity factors and the displacement intensity factors do not depend explicitly upon the velocity of the crack tip.