Modeling of particle fracture by repeated impacts using continuum damage mechanics

Damage mechanics is a field in the mechanics of solids that has evolved significantly in the past few decades, particularly given its ability of describing situations where traditional fracture mechanics becomes either too complex or is unavailable. This paper exploits the link between damage accumulation that takes place during a single impact and the progressive weakening that occurs after repeated impact, ultimately resulting in a broken particle. It associates the increase in internal crack-like damage in the particle to the degradation of the material stiffness. The model has been validated using experimental data from repeated-impact tests on single particles in the ultrafast load cell (UFLC).