Results on fracture mechanics and crack propagation have been obtained, making use of Vickers microhardness studies on two different crystallographic planes [(110) and (001)] of flux grown erbium aluminate crystals in the load ranging from 10-100 g. The variation of microhardness with load which is best explained by Hays and Kendall’s law leads to the load independent values of hardness. Classification of cracks is dealt with and it is reported that the transition from Palmqvist to median types of cracks occurs at higher loads. The values of fracture toughness (K_C), and brittleness index (B_i) are calculated using median types of cracks.
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