A comment on the maximum dynamic tensile strength of a concrete-like material

An equation which caters for strain rate effect only and is used in the construction of a recently developed computational model for a concrete-like material subjected to impact loading shows that the dynamic uniaxial tensile strength of a concrete-like material has a limit (maximum) value at very high strain rate. In this note, the physical meaning of the maximum dynamic uniaxial tensile strength of a concrete-like material due to strain rate only is discussed and the method to determine its value explored. It is demonstrated that both the maximum dynamic uniaxial tensile strength and the maximum dynamic uniaxial unconfined compressive strength due to strain rate only can be determined by the maximum dynamic shear stress through a recently developed shear wave tracing (SWT) technique.