Visualization of impact damage in annealed and chemically strengthened aluminosilicate glass

Abstract The damage propagation and fracture process of monolithic annealed and chemically strengthened aluminosilicate (ALS) glass plates are characterized using Edge-on impact (EOI) testing technique. The EOI experiments on two types of ALS glass plates at a medium impact velocity of ∼180 m/s with spherical and cylinders steel projectiles were completed using pneumatic gas-gun. The high-speed images in shadowgraph mode during the impact process were recorded at the framing rate of 1,000,000 frames per second (fps) to visualize the fracture and damage front in annealed and strengthened glass plates. The real-time captured shadowgraphs in case of annealed glass (AG) showed that the damage front initially starts to develop from the impact end and then after traveling some distance arrested in few microseconds and measured average front velocity against cylindrical and spherical projectile was 2658.91 m/s and 1710.0 m/s, respectively. The tensile wave reflection in AG impact case against both types of projectiles was observed. In a chemically strengthened glass (CSG), the damage front shape and propagation against both types of projectiles were quite different than the AG, front traveled in a self-sustained mode due to the release of elastic stored energy with the velocity of 1746.92 m/s and 1690.12 m/s, respectively. The damage evolution curves plotted from captured high-speed images show that damage traveled slower in case of the spherical projectile which suggests that the shape of the projectile has a great influence on the fracture process of annealed and strengthened glass. The damage front shape in CSG against cylindrical projectile impact was more dominant along the glass boundaries and the spallation effect was not observed in CSG against spherical projectile impact. Additionally, the damage-free zones and fracture surfaces were studied using a scan electron microscope (SEM) from collected post-test debris to discuss the fracture process.