Numerical and experimental study of crack behaviour at the zinc/TRIP steel 800 interface

In the present study, the behaviour of a crack with different orientations at the zinc/steel bi-material interface was investigated. ABAQUS finite element simulation was used for the estimation of stress intensity factor and energy release rate. It was found that the normalised stress intensity factor in the coating decreases and rapidly increases once the crack crosses the interface. The computation of the ratio between the energy release rate for deflection and penetration showed a value much lower than 1 whatever the crack orientation is. This result means that a crack is much more likely to deflect than to penetrate into the interface. In addition, analytical and numerical results were confirmed by microscopic examinations obtained from SEM observations.