DUAL BOUNDARY ELEMENT METHOD FOR 3-DIMENSIONAL FRACTURE-MECHANICS ANALYSIS

In this paper, an effective numerical implementation of the three-dimensional dual boundary element method, for linear elastic crack problems, is presented. Displacement and traction integral equations which constitute the dual boundary formulation are used independently on crack surfaces to overcome the numerical difficulties associated with co-planar crack surfaces in boundary element analysis. The crack surfaces are modelled with discontinuous quadrilateral quadratic elements. The use of discontinuous elements allow for accurate integration of finite part integrals. The accuracy of the proposed method is demonstrated by solving a number of problems including edge and embedded cracks.