Simulation of the nonplanar three-dimensional thermal cracking using the finite element-meshfree method

摘要

Thermal cracking widely exists in nature and engineering practices, attracting more and more attention nowadays. Understanding the failure mechanism of thermal cracking is critical to improving the efficiency and safety of engineering applications. Despite great efforts have been performed on the numerical modeling of thermal cracking, accurately representing and tracking a nonplanar three-dimensional (3D) cracking pattern is still a challenge. In this work, a novel thermo-mechanical coupling model (FEMM-TM), combining a heat transfer algorithm and the finite element-meshfree method (FEMM), is proposed to simulate the nonplanar 3D thermal cracking problems, involving the temperature transfer, thermal stress distribution, as well as the crack propagation and coalescence. The performance of the proposed FEMM-TM model is validated by numerical tests with analytical or numerical solutions. The nonplanar 3D thermal cracking problems under different thermal loading conditions are further investigated. Results show that the proposed method can be effectively deployed in the analysis of nonplanar 3D thermal cracking problems.