A new methodology that enables us to compute the arbitrary shaped 3D crack problems is studied. In the present method, it is possible to analyze the 3D crack problems without preparing mesh data as in ordinary boundary elements but with defining a sequence of nodal points representing the crack front and the internal nodal points that define a crack surface as well as a shape function used for determining unknown variables. The present method has special potential for analyzing a complicated 3D crack geometry which is generally difficult to treat in usual element based methods. In the present research, we apply mesh-free body force method to analyze the growth of 3D planar cracks. In concrete, a crack growth analysis for initially rectangular or elliptical crack existing in an infinite solid under uniform tensile stress perpendicular to the crack surface at infinity is demonstrated
Towards a Vortex Generator Model for Integral Boundary Layer Methods
