The effect of yield strength mis-match on the fracture analysis of welded joints: slip-line field solutions for pure bending

Plane strain and plane stress slip-line solutions for single notched bending specimens with a central mismatched welded joint have been derived. The crack has been located on the fusion line (interface) and at the middle of the weld metal. 2D and 3D ®nite element analysis has been performed to verify the theoretical results and to investigate the e€ect of specimen thickness. From these solutions, the stress distribution and deformation ®eld in the weld metal, the expressions for the yield load as well as the constraint state at the crack tip are determined. The resulting relations for estimating 3D e€ects coincide with the test results