THIRD INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS ON FRACTURE

Munich, April 8-13, 1973

The f i r s t International Congress on Fracture was held in Sendai, Japan, in

1965. Four years later a second conference was organized in Brighton, England.

Following a suggestion of Prof. Yokobori i t was decided in Brighton to hold a

Conference on Fracture every four years. Prof. Kochend~rfer of the Max-Planck-

Inst i tute fur Eisenforschung was asked to plan the Third International Congress

on Fracture in Munich in 1973. The technical organization was the responsibil-

i ty of the Verein Deutscher EisenhUttenleute, DUsseldorf, Germany.

From 350 submitted papers 270 were accepted. Because of this large number

of contributions parallel sessions could not be avoided, but a very wide spect-

rum from the entire f ie ld of fracture was presented.

The scient i f ic program was subdivided into 9 groups:

I. Theory of Fracture

IIo Criterions of Fracture Including Fracture Mechanics

I l l . Microstructural Aspects of Fracture in Metals

IV. Influence of Corrosion and Environmental Factors in Fracture Processes

V. Fatigue Phenomena

VI. Fracture Processes in Plastics

VII. Fracture Processes in Composites

VIII . Technical Applications

IX. Fracture Processes in Glass, Ceramics, Rocks and Concrete

Parallel sessions certainly do not stimulate interdiscipl inary discussions,

but this disadvantage has been partly overcome by introducing invited plenary

lectures. Each group was preceded by one or more plenary lectures which were

open to all delegates. I t was a commendable gesture on the part of the organ-

izing committee to devote five plenary lectures to group IX (Glass, Ceramics,

Rocks and Concrete) because i t was fe l t that this topic had been neglected in

the past. Titles and authors of plenary lectures are given as follows:

la. Dislocations and Cracks, by B. A. Bilby, Sheffield (England).

lb. Theory of Fracture of ~uasi-Britt le Bodies, by G. I. Baren- b lat t , Moscow (USSR).

11. Testing Methods for Determination of Fractur ~ Toughness of Metals, by H. T. Corten, Urbana, I l l i no is (USA).

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VII.

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VIIIb.

IXa.

IXb.

IXc.

IXd.

IXe.

Relations between Microstructure and the Fracture Toughness of Metals, by G. T. Hahn and A. R. Rosenfield, Columbus, Ohio (USA). Environ~mntal Factors in Crack Propagation, by J. C. Scully, Leeds (England). Fundamental Knowledge of Fatigue Fracture, by J. C. Grosskreutz, Washington (USA). Zur experimentellen Lebensdauer-Ermittlun 9 von Konstruktions- elementen mit zufallsartigen Beanspruchungen, by E. Gassner, Darmstadt (Germany). Fracture Theories in Industrial Use of Thermoplastic and Glassfiber Reinforced Plastics, by E. Gaube and H. H. Kausch, Frankfurt (Germany).

Atomic Mechanism of Fracture and Creep of PoIxmers, by S. N. Zhurkov, Leningrad (USSR).

Mechanics of Fracture in Polymeric Solids, by W. G. Knauss, Pasadena, California (USA). Fracture Phenomena in Composites, by A. Kelly, Teddington (England).

Technical Application of Fracture Mechanics to Thin-Walled Structures, by H. Kihara, Suita (Japan) and K. Ikeda, Amaga- saki (Japan).

Some Applications of Fracture Mechanics in Power Engineering, by R. W. Nichols, Warrington (England).

Bruchvorg~nge in Gl~sern, by F. Kerkhof, Freiburg (Germany).

Ini t iat ion and Spread of Fracture in Ceramics, by V. D. Fr~chette, Alfred, New York (USA).

Fracture of Concretes, by T. C. Hansen, Copenhagen (Denmark).

Fracture in Rocks and Engineering Implications, by C. Fair- hurst and M. P. Hardy, Minneapolis, Minnesota (USA).

Fracture Physics in Comminution, by H. R. Rumpf, Karlsruhe (Germany).

There was additional invited plenary lecture of general interest:

An Interdisciplinary Approach to Fracture and Fatigue Fracture of Solids, by T. Yokobori, Sendai (Japan).

The meeting ended with a well organized and stimulating panel discussion.

Though each written contribution (plenary lectures excluded) was limited

to 5 pages, the preprint of the conference proceedings consists of approximately

1800 pages. I t must be regretted that there wil l be no Conference proceedings.

But a limited number of copies of preprints wil l be available from the Verein Deutscher EisenhUttenleute, DUsseldorf, P.O.B. 8209. Nearly all contributions

concerning fracture of concrete are published in ful l length in this special

i i i

issue of CEMENT and CONCRETE RESEARCH. We hope that this collection wil l help

to c lar i fy the state of the art and at the same time contribute to development

of new ideas and new techniques in this special f ie ld. I t would seem that a

closer contact between people doing research on concrete with colleagues doing

similar work on different materials would be beneficial.

I think that all those who attended the meeting wil l agree that we should

thank Prof. Kochend~rfer and the Organizing Comn~ttee for all the effort they

put into planning and organizing this meeting in Munich which was both success.

ful and enjoyable.

F. H. Wittmann

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