Collisions and Fracture: a 1-D Theory. How to Tear off a Chandelier from the Ceiling

When a plate falls on the ground, it breaks. We study this phenomenon at the macroscopic level. We restrict ourselves to 1-D problems and illustrate the theory with a chandelier to which a falling stone is tied. The collisions are assumed instantaneous. Percussions are introduced at the unknown fracture points. Equations of motion and constitutive laws give a set of differential equations, whose corresponding variational problem may be solved in SBV (special functions of bounded variation). The example shows how the theory applies and gives realistic results.