PSI - Issue 79

Manish Singh Rajput et al. / Procedia Structural Integrity 79 (2026) 26–33

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4.2 Effect of the thermal loading direction During the working of aircraft wings, wind turbine blades, and automobile structures, the direction of thermal loading may vary according to the performance requirement. Henceforth in this sub-section, the direction of thermal load is changed from top edge thermal loading to right edge thermal loading, and the effect on the thermo mechanical fracture behaviour of the CFRC structure is investigated. The geometry and loading conditions for this study are illustrated in Fig. 3(b). From the obtained load displacement relation (refer to Fig. 7(a)), the higher load bearing capacity is observed for the top edge heating because of the generation of compressive thermal strain just opposite to the applied mechanical loading. Fig. 8(i) illustrates the crack path findings for the right-edge heating condition. A similar crack initiation, but different crack propagation, is observed compared to the top edge heating condition (refer to Fig. 5(i)) due to the different thermal loading direction. A slightly lower load-bearing capacity is observed for the top edge cooling condition because the induced tensile thermal strains are in the direction of the applied mechanical loading, as shown in Fig. 7(b). The crack growth plots are presented in Fig. 8(ii) for the right edge cooling condition. The effect of the direction of thermal loading is evident during crack initiation and propagation, as shown in Fig. 5(ii) (top edge cooling case) and Fig. 8(ii) (right edge cooling case).

Fig. 7. Comparison of load displacement response for top edge and right edge thermal loading under (a) heating environment, (b) cooling environment.

Fig. 8. Crack path at different displacement values under (i) thermo-mechanical right edge heating condition: (a) 0.0 mm, (b) 0.00075 mm, (c) 0.00194 mm, and (d) 0.00228 mm, and (ii) right edge cooling condition: (a) 0.0 mm, (b) 0.00063 mm, (c) 0.0008 mm, and (d) 0.00108 mm.