Delayed Fracture of an Aging Viscoelastic Composite under Plane Strain

The theory of delayed fracture of cracked viscoelastic bodies and the method of continued fractions are used to study the problem on the delayed fracture of an unidirectional fibrous composite subjected to uniaxial tension under plane-strain conditions. The aging viscoelastic binder contains a mode I macrocrack, which is parallel to the fibers. The results of a numerical crack-resistance analysis of a composite whose aging properties are described by the Volterra operator with the Maslov–Arutyunyan kernel are presented. A convergence analysis is made of the expansion of an irrational function of the resolvent Volterra operator into a continued fraction.