Effect of the presence of a secondary transverse load on the inter-fibre failure under tension

•The presence of an interface crack is modeled by means of BEM models.•The possible kinking of the crack towards the matrix is considered.•The growth of the crack under tension dominated biaxial loads is studied.•The presence of a compressive secondary load would promote failure.•The presence of a tensile secondary load would slightly inhibit the failure.

The objective of this paper is the study of the inter-fibre/matrix failure under biaxial loading. In particular the influence at micromechanical scale of the presence of a secondary transverse load (tension or compression) perpendicular to the transverse tension nominally responsible for the failure is studied for all phases of the mechanism of damage. The Boundary Element Method is employed and Interfacial Fracture Mechanics concepts are used for the analysis of the results. The results lead to the conclusion that the presence of a compressive secondary load would promote failure whereas a tensile one would inhibit the mechanism of damage only slightly.