Fracture Analysis of Coated Materials: Analytical Stress Intensity Factors With XFEM Validation

ABSTRACT The presence of a bimaterial interface significantly modifies the crack‐tip stress field and, consequently, can influence crack behavior and deflect the crack‐propagation path. Developing models capable of accurately capturing interface effects is therefore essential for a reliable understanding of interacting multicrack systems. In this paper, we develop an original analytical approach to approximate the stress intensity factors in coated (bimaterial) configurations. Numerical simulations are performed using the extended finite element method (XFEM) implemented in Abaqus and automated via Python scripts. A range of substrate materials and crack lengths is considered to assess the validity and robustness of the proposed formulation. The analytical predictions are compared with XFEM results for various crack spacings and stiffness ratios. Furthermore, we investigate the interaction between two neighboring cracks in the presence of a bimaterial interface.