Engineering Commons^™

Energy And Thermodynamically Based Approaches For Analysis Of Damage In Contact Problems, Afshin Babaie Aghdam

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

A novel methodology for analysis of damage in contact problems in presented. Two important categories of contact damage are studied, namely crack nucleation and adhesive wear. The proposed methodology is primarily based on the laws of energy and thermodynamics, and as such offers great advantages by unifying the analysis of damage in a variety of contact configurations. Crack nucleation is the first damage type analyzed. For this purpose, the line-contact fretting configuration is chosen. A thermodynamically-based continuum damage mechanics (CDM) approach is employed. Intense stress gradients in the contact region are found to be highly influential in the crack nucleation …