Framework to Correlate Test Specimen Thickness Effect on Fracture Toughness With T33-Stress

This paper considered the test specimen thickness effect on the fracture toughness of a material Jc, in the transition temperature region, for CT and 3PB specimen. Framework to correlate test specimen thickness effect on fracture toughness with T33-stress, which is the out-of-plane elastic crack tip constraint parameter, was proposed. The results seemed to indicate a possibility of improving the existing methods to correlate the fracture toughness obtained by test specimen with the toughness of actual cracks found in the structure, in use of T33–stress.