Purpose: The investigations aim to propose a model for arresting an electrical opening of a crack which weakens a narrow, poled and infinite piezoelectric strip. The edges of the strip are subjected to uniform, constant anti-plane stresses and in-plane electrical displacements.Design/methodology/approach: The loads applied at the edges of the strip open the crack in a self-similar fashion. Consequently at each tip of the crack a saturation zone protrudes. To stop the crack from further opening the rims of developed saturation zones are subjected to normal, cohesive linearly varying saturation limit electric displacement. The edges of the strip are subjected to anti-plane deformation and in-plane electrical displacement. Fourier integral transform method employed reduces the problem to the solution of a Fredholm integral equation of second kind.Findings: The electrical displacement, stress intensity factor, the saturation zone length, crack opening displacement and crack growth rate have been calculated. The results obtained presented graphically, analysed and concluded.Research limitations/implications: The ceramic used for strip is being assumed to be electrically more brittle. The investigations are carried at this level in the present paper. Also the small scale electrical yielding is considered. Consequently the developed saturation zone is proposed to lie in a line segment ahead of crack.Practical implications: Piezoelectric ceramics being widely used as transducers. Their wide utility has prompted to study many attires of such ceramic and one such attire is fracture mechanics of these ceramics.Originality/value: The paper gives an assessment of the electrical load necessary to arrest the electrical crack opening. The investigations are useful to smart material design technology where sensors and actuators are manufactured
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