Assessment of energy dissipation during mixed-mode delamination growth using cohesive zone models

The use of cohesive elements to simulate delamination growth involves modeling the inelastic region existing ahead of the crack tip. Recent numerical and experimental findings indicate that the mixed-mode ratio varies at each material point within the inelastic region ahead of the crack tip during crack propagation, even for those specimens whose mixed-mode ratio is expected to be constant. Although the local variation of the mode mixity may adversely affect the predicted numerical results, most existing formulations do not take it into account. In this work, the mode-decomposed J-integral is implemented as a finite element post-processing tool to obtain the strain energy release rates and the mixed-mode ratio of the inelastic region as a whole, allowing the assessment of crack propagation in terms of energy dissipation and mixed-mode ratio computation. Different cohesive elements are assessed with this method.