A steady-state frictional crack in a strip

Abstract

The analogy between frictional cracks, propagating along interfaces in frictional contact, and ordinary cracks in bulk materials is important in various fields. We consider a stress-controlled frictional crack propagating at a velocity $c_r$ along an interface separating two strips, each of height $H$, the frictional counterpart of the classical problem of a displacement-controlled crack in a strip, which played central roles in understanding material failure. We show that steady-state frictional cracks in a strip geometry require a nonmonotonic dependence of the frictional strength on the slip velocity and, in sharp contrast to their classical counterparts, feature a vanishing stress drop. Here, rupture is driven by energy flowing to its edge from behind, generated by an excess power of the external stress, and to be accompanied by an increase in the stored elastic energy, in qualitative contrast to the classical counterpart that is driven by the release of elastic energy stored ahead of the propagating edge. Finally, we derive a complete set of mesoscopic and macroscopic scaling relations for frictional cracks in a strip geometry and demonstrate that the stress singularity near their edges is proportional to $(\Delta v/c_r)\sqrt{H}$, where $\Delta v$ is the slip velocity rise accompanying their propagation. The relevance of our findings for various phenomena, including slow rupture/earthquakes, is briefly discussed.