On the effects of an electric field on the fracture toughness of poled piezoelectric ceramics

Central crack specimens have been used to study the effects of an applied electric field on the fracture toughness of poled soft lead zirconate titanate ceramics (PZT-5). The ultrasonic lapping technique was used to machine the central crack of the specimens used. The present experimental study illustrated that changing the field from negative to positive reduced the fracture toughness of a specimen subjected to an applied electric field. These experimental results were in agreement with the observations made by Park and Sun (J. Am. Ceram. Soc. 78 (1995) 1475) and Heyer et al. (Acta Mater. 46 (1998) 6615). Finite element results were employed to compare with the experimental data. Four fracture criteria, i.e. total energy release rate, mechanical energy release rate, local energy release rate and strain energy release rate, were compared with the experimental results. It was found the local energy release rate, which was defined based on a strip electric saturation model, was in broad agreement with the experimental observations. Moreover, it was found that the strain energy density criterion was unable to describe the effect of electric field on fracture toughness when a large electric field was applied.