A finite strain elastic-viscoplastic self-consistent model for polycrystalline materials

A large strain elastic-viscoplastic self-consistent (EVPSC) model for polycrystalline materials is developed. At single crystal level, both the rate sensitive slip and twinning are included as the plastic deformation mechanisms, while elastic anisotropy is accounted for in the elastic moduli. The transition from single crystal plasticity to polycrystal plasticity is based on a completely self-consistent approach. It is shown that the differences in the predicted stress-strain curves and texture evolutions based on the EVPSC and the viscoplastic self-consistent (VPSC) model proposed by Lebensohn and Tomé (1993) are negligible at large strains for monotonic loadings. For the deformations involving unloading and strain path changes, the EVPSC predicts a smooth elasto-plastic transition, while the VPSC model gives a discontinuous response due to lack of elastic deformation. It is also demonstrated that the EVPSC model can capture some important experimental features which cannot be simulated by using the VPSC model.     

Deformation of thermosetting resins at impact rates of strain. Part 2: constitutive model with rejuvenation

The constitutive responses of three glassy thermoset polymers at impact rates of strain and slower, together with measurements of adiabatic heating, were reported earlier by the authors. The results are interpreted here in the context of a constitutive model proposed previously for amorphous polymers, expanded to incorporate strain-softening and the adiabatic heating deficit. In terms of the model, both features are a natural consequence of strain-induced evolution of the glass structure, as represented by Tool's “fictive temperature”—the phenomenon of structural rejuvenation. A representation is proposed for the evolution of fictive temperature with plastic strain, motivated by an approximate treatment of the kinetics of physical ageing/rejuvenation. Formulated in this manner, the model agrees reasonably well with experimental results across the wide range of strain rates of the previous experiments, 10⁻³ to , and across most of the range of strain to failure in compression. At the highest strains, however, an additional adiabatic heating deficit appears that is not predicted by the model, either suggesting the onset of structural breakdown possibly associated with the appearance of cracks or reflecting a need for better physical understanding of large deformations in glassy polymers.     

Two exact micromechanics-based nonlocal constitutive equations for random linear elastic composite materials

A Hashin-Shtrikman-Willis variational principle is employed to derive two exact micromechanics-based nonlocal constitutive equations relating ensemble averages of stress and strain for two-phase, and also many types of multi-phase, random linear elastic composite materials. By exact is meant that the constitutive equations employ the complete spatially-varying ensemble-average strain field, not gradient approximations to it as were employed in the previous, related work of Drugan and Willis (J. Mech. Phys. Solids 44 (1996) 497) and Drugan (J. Mech. Phys. Solids 48 (2000) 1359) (and in other, more phenomenological works). Thus, the nonlocal constitutive equations obtained here are valid for arbitrary ensemble-average strain fields, not restricted to slowly-varying ones as is the case for gradient-approximate nonlocal constitutive equations. One approach presented shows how to solve the integral equations arising from the variational principle directly and exactly, for a special, physically reasonable choice of the homogeneous comparison material. The resulting nonlocal constitutive equation is applicable to composites of arbitrary anisotropy, and arbitrary phase contrast and volume fraction. One exact nonlocal constitutive equation derived using this approach is valid for two-phase composites having any statistically uniform distribution of phases, accounting for up through two-point statistics and arbitrary phase shape. It is also shown that the same approach can be used to derive exact nonlocal constitutive equations for a large class of composites comprised of more than two phases, still permitting arbitrary elastic anisotropy. The second approach presented employs three-dimensional Fourier transforms, resulting in a nonlocal constitutive equation valid for arbitrary choices of the comparison modulus for isotropic composites. This approach is based on use of the general representation of an isotropic fourth-rank tensor function of a vector variable, and its inverse. The exact nonlocal constitutive equations derived from these two approaches are applied to some example cases, directly rationalizing some recently-obtained numerical simulation results and assessing the accuracy of previous results based on gradient-approximate nonlocal constitutive equations.     

A multiscale approach for modeling scale-dependent yield stress in polycrystalline metals

Modeling of scale-dependent characteristics of mechanical properties of metal polycrystals is studied using both discrete dislocation dynamics and continuum crystal plasticity. The initial movements of dislocation arc emitted from a Frank-Read type dislocation source and bounded by surrounding grain boundaries are examined by dislocation dynamics analyses system and we find the minimum resolved shear stress for the FR source to emit at least one closed loop. When the grain size is large enough compared to the size of FR source, the minimum resolved shear stress levels off to a certain value, but when the grain size is close to the size of the FR source, the minimum resolved shear stress shows a sharp increase. These results are modeled into the expression of the critical resolved shear stress of slip systems and continuum mechanics based crystal plasticity analyses of six-grained polycrystal models are made. Results of the crystal plasticity analyses show a distinct increase of macro- and microscopic yield stress for specimens with smaller mean grain diameter. Scale-dependent characteristics of the yield stress and its relation to some control parameters are discussed.     

Visco-plastic constitutive modeling on Ohno-Wang kinematic hardening rule for uniaxial ratcheting behavior of Z2CND18.12N steel

Experimental results of monotonic uniaxial tensile tests at different strain rates and the reversed strain cycling test showed the characteristics of rate-dependence and cyclic hardening of Z2CND18.12N austenitic stainless steel at room temperature, respectively. Based on the Ohno-Wang kinematic hardening rule, a visco-plastic constitutive model incorporated with isotropic hardening was developed to describe the uniaxial ratcheting behavior of Z2CND18.12N steel under various stress-controlled loading conditions. Predicted results of the developed model agreed better with experimental results when the ratcheting strain level became higher, but the developed model overestimated the ratcheting deformation in other cases. A modified model was proposed to improve the prediction accuracy. In the modified model, the parameter m_i of the Ohno-Wang kinematic hardening rule was developed to evolve with the accumulated plastic strain. Simulation results of the modified model proved much better agreement with experiments.     

Solution existence conditions for elastoplastic constitutive models of granular materials

In this paper, the conditions of solution existence for stress rates under given strain rates are investigated. The focus of the solution existence investigation is on the non-associated flow rule and elastic stress–strain relationship. Granular materials characterized with strong non-associated plastic flows are used as a particular example for analysis. Various flow rules for granular materials are analyzed, including Rowe’s, Roscoe’s flow rules and their modified versions. In the elastic stress–strain relationships of materials, the effects of Poisson’s ratio on solution existence are investigated. Both isotropic and anisotropic elasticity are considered. Given a granular material and its states, it is found that there exists a critical Poisson’s ratio for a particular non-associated flow rule. When the Poisson’s ratio of a material is above this critical Poisson’s ratio, its constitutive model is susceptible to solution non-existence. It is suggested that special attentions should be paid to the selection of material Poisson’s ratio and non-associated flow rule to ensure the existence of elastoplastic solutions.     

On the r-value of textured sheet metals

The r-value of a sheet metal is a measure of plastic anisotropy frequently used for prediction of performance in deep-drawing. It has also figured prominently in the literature for validation of theories where the predicted angular dependence of r is compared with the measured dependence. As plastic anisotropy in sheet metals is caused mainly by the preferred orientations of grains within the polycrystalline metal, it is natural to ask how r would depend on the orientation distribution function (ODF) w which defines the crystallographic texture of the polycrystal. In this paper a general formula relating r to w is derived for textured sheet metals whose plastic flow behavior is governed by a plastic potential f(σ, w), the anisotropic part of which depends linearly on the texture coefficients; here σ denotes the deviator of the Cauchy stress. Specific forms of this formula for orthorhombic sheets of cubic and of hexagonal metals are explicitly given.     

Constitutive framework optimized for myocardium and other high-strain, laminar materials with one fiber family

Central to this analysis is the identification of six rotation invariant scalars α_1-6 that succinctly define the strain in materials that have one family of parallel fibers arranged in laminae. These scalars were chosen so as to minimize covariance amongst the response terms in the hyperelastic limit, and they are termed strain attributes because it is necessary to distinguish them from strain invariants. The Cauchy stress t is expressed as the sum of six response terms, almost all of which are mutually orthogonal for finite strain (i.e. 14 of the 15 inner products vanish). For small deformations, the response terms are entirely orthogonal (i.e. all 15 inner products vanish). A response term is the product of a response function with its associated kinematic tensor. Each response function is a scalar partial derivative of the strain energy W with respect to a strain attribute. Applications for this theory presently include myocardium (heart muscle) which is often modeled as having muscle fibers arranged in sheets. Utility for experimental identification of strain energy functions is demonstrated by showing that common tests on incompressible materials can directly determine terms in W. Since the described set of strain attributes reduces the covariance amongst response terms, this approach may enhance the speed and precision of inverse finite element methods.     

Characterization of yielding behavior of polycrystalline metals with single crystal plasticity based on representative characteristic length

Single crystal plasticity based on a representative characteristic length is proposed and introduced into a homogenization approach based on finite element analyses, which are applied to characterization of distinctive yielding behaviors of polycrystalline metals, yield-point elongation, and grain size strengthening. The computational manner for an implicit stress update is derived with the framework of a standard multi-surface plasticity at finite strain, where the evolution of the characteristic lengths are numerically converted from the accumulated slips of all of slip systems by exploiting the mathematical feature of the characteristic length as the intermediate function of the plastic internal variables. Furthermore, a constitutive model for a single crystal reproduces the stress–strain curve divided into three parts. Using two-scale finite element analysis, the macroscopic stress–strain response with yield-point elongation under a situation of low dislocation density is reproduced. Finally, the grain size effect on the yield strength is analyzed with modeling of the grain boundary in the context of the proposed constitutive model and is discussed from both macroscopic and microscopic views.     

Fully coupled, multi-axial, symmetric constitutive laws for polycrystalline ferroelectric ceramics

In this paper, a general form for multi-axial constitutive laws for ferroelectric ceramics is constructed. The foundation of the theory is an assumed form for the Helmholtz free energy of the material. Switching surfaces and associated flow rules are postulated in a modified stress and electric field space such that a positive dissipation rate during switching is guaranteed. The resulting tangent moduli relating increments of stress and electric field to increments of strain and electric displacement are symmetric since changes in the linear elastic, dielectric and piezoelectric properties of the material are included in the switching surface. Finally, parameters of the model are determined for two uncoupled cases, namely non-remanent straining ferroelectrics and purely ferroelastic switching, and then for the fully coupled ferroelectric case.     

Cyclic thermomechanical behavior of a polycrystalline pseudoelastic shape memory alloy

In this work, 3D finite element modeling is employed to examine the thermomechanical behavior of a polycrystalline Ni-Ti shape memory alloy in the pseudoelastic regime. It is shown that the tension-compression asymmetry during uniaxial cyclic loading is due to a preferred orientation of the crystallographic texture. In pure shear loading, the thermomechanical behavior exhibits symmetry in both senses of shear, due to the fiber texture of the specimen bar stock. It is also shown that the apparent strain rate-dependence is due to thermomechanical coupling with latent heat generation/absorption during phase transformation.     

Large strain deformation of polycrystalline metals at low homologous temperatures

Large strain compression data (true strains to about ?3.0) are presented for polycrystalline α U and α Fe at room temperature. The results, together with other published data at low homologous temperatures (≈0.2 T_m), where T_m is the absolute melting temperature, suggest that a steady-state flow stress σ_s is approached after extensive strain-hardening, α U exhibits a very high strain-hardening rate, with σ_s ≈ 2900 MPa (420 ksi) indicating that cold-working is a very potent method of strengthening this metal. All the data evaluated can be fit by the stress-strain relation σ = σ_s? exp (?(Nε)^p)(σ_s? σ_y), where σ_y is the yield stess, p is a constant equal to a for the metals analyzed, N is a constant associated with the strain-hardening characteristics of a material, σ is true stress, and ε is true strain.     

Modeling transients in the mechanical response of copper due to strain path changes

When copper is deformed to large strains its texture and microstructure change drastically, leading to plastic anisotropy and extended transients when it is reloaded along a different strain path. For predicting these transients, we develop a constitutive model for polycrystalline metals that incorporates texture and grain microstructure. The directional anisotropy in the single crystals is considered to be induced by variable latent hardening associated with cross-slip, cut-through of planar dislocation walls, and dislocation-based reversal mechanisms. These effects are introduced in a crystallographic hardening model which is, in turn, implemented into a polycrystal model. This approach successfully explains the flow response of OFHC Cu pre-loaded in tension (compression) and reloaded in tension (compression), and the response of OFHC Cu severely strained in shear by equal channel angular extrusion and subsequently compressed in each of the three orthogonal directions. This new theoretical framework applies to arbitrary strain path changes, and is fully anisotropic.     

Constitutive equations for no-tension materials

Summary For a material which is incapable of sustaining tensile stresses (no-tension material, NTM), the local stability postulate is utilized in order to derive the appropriate equations which relate, within general 3D situations, cracking strain states and stress states to each other. Several alternative forms of these equations are discussed, either in terms of stress and strain components, or in terms of stress and strain invariants. The results obtained improve known results regarding the NTM's.

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Sommario Per un materiale non resistente a trazione in stati di tensione e deformazione triassiali viene utilizzato il postulate di stabilità locale per ottenere appropriate equazioni che mettono in relazione gli stati di deformazione fragile (o fessurativa) con gli stati di tensione. Sono discusse alcune forme alternative di queste equazioni espresse in termini di componenti di tensione e di deformazione, oppure in termini di invarianti delle tensioni e delle deformazioni. I risultati ottenuti comprovano e arricchiscono noti risultati riguardanti i materiali che non resistono a trazione.

     

Homogenization of intergranular fracture towards a transient gradient damage model

This paper focuses on the intergranular fracture of polycrystalline materials, where a detailed model at the meso-scale is translated onto the macro-level through a proposed homogenization theory. The bottom-up strategy involves the introduction of an additional macro-kinematic field to characterize the average displacement jump within the unit cell. Together with the standard macro-strain field, the underlying processes are propagated onto the macro-scale by imposing the equivalence of power and energy at the two scales. The set of macro-governing equations and constitutive relations are next extracted naturally as per standard thermodynamics procedure. The resulting homogenized microforce balance recovers the so-called ‘implicit’ gradient expression with a transient nonlocal interaction. The homogenized gradient damage model is shown to fully regularize the softening behavior, i.e. the structural response is made mesh-independent, with the damage strain correctly localizing into a macroscopic crack, hence resolving the spurious damage growth observed in many conventional gradient damage models. Furthermore, the predictive capability of the homogenized model is demonstrated by benchmarking its solutions against reference meso-solutions, where a good match is obtained with minimal calibrations, for two different grain sizes.     

A constitutive model for plastically anisotropic solids with non-spherical voids

Plastic constitutive relations are derived for a class of anisotropic porous materials consisting of coaxial spheroidal voids, arbitrarily oriented relative to the embedding orthotropic matrix. The derivations are based on nonlinear homogenization, limit analysis and micromechanics. A variational principle is formulated for the yield criterion of the effective medium and specialized to a spheroidal representative volume element containing a confocal spheroidal void and subjected to uniform boundary deformation. To obtain closed form equations for the effective yield locus, approximations are introduced in the limit-analysis based on a restricted set of admissible microscopic velocity fields. Evolution laws are also derived for the microstructure, defined in terms of void volume fraction, aspect ratio and orientation, using material incompressibility and Eshelby-like concentration tensors. The new yield criterion is an extension of the well known isotropic Gurson model. It also extends previous analyses of uncoupled effects of void shape and material anisotropy on the effective plastic behavior of solids containing voids. Preliminary comparisons with finite element calculations of voided cells show that the model captures non-trivial effects of anisotropy heretofore not picked up by void growth models.     

A unified treatment of strain gradient plasticity

A theoretical framework is presented that has potential to cover a large range of strain gradient plasticity effects in isotropic materials. Both incremental plasticity and viscoplasticity models are presented. Many of the alternative models that have been presented in the literature are included as special cases. Based on the expression for plastic dissipation, it is in accordance with Gurtin (J. Mech. Phys. Solids 48 (2000) 989; Int. J. Plast. 19 (2003) 47) argued that the plastic flow direction is governed by a microstress q_ij and not the deviatoric Cauchy stress σ_ij′ that has been assumed by many others. The structure of the governing equations is of second order in the displacements and the plastic strains which makes it comparatively easy to implement in a finite element programme. In addition, a framework for the formulation of consistent boundary conditions is presented. It is shown that there is a close connection between surface energy of an interface and boundary conditions in terms of plastic strains and moment stresses. This should make it possible to study boundary layer effects at the interface between grains or phases. Consistent boundary conditions for an expanding elastic-plastic boundary are as well formulated. As examples, biaxial tension of a thin film on a thick substrate, torsion of a thin wire and a spherical void under remote hydrostatic tension are investigated.