Elastic-plastic analysis of the J integral for repaired cracks in plates

In this paper, three-dimensional finite element method is used to analyze the J integral for repaired cracks in plates with bonded composite patch and stiffeners. For elastic the effect of cracks, the thickness of the patch (er) and properties of the patch are presented for calculating the J integral. For elastic-plastic a several calculations have been realized to extract the plasticized elements around the crack tip of repaired and un-repaired crack. The obtained results show that the presence of the composite patch and stiffener reduces considerably the size of the plastic zone ahead of the crack. The effects of crack size and the inter-distance of repaired cracks were analysed.