Continuous-discontinuous modeling of failure

ABSTRACT This paper illustrates the advantages of a continuous-discontinuous failure description. Examples using standard strain-hardening plasticity, strain-softening gradient-enhanced damage and viscoplastic damage show that a better approximation of failure processes can be achieved by using numerical techniques in which a discontinuity is naturally endowed in the model itself and is activated at some stage during localization (by using a cohesive discontinuity) or after the localization process has been completed (by using a traction-free discontinuity). Failure can then be realistically described as progressive material degradation which develops into a discrete crack for which a discontinuity in the displacement field is a suitable representation.