Fracture Analysis of Laminated composite plates using Extended Finite Element Method: A Review

Year : 2026 | Volume : 04 | Issue : 01 | Page : 16 25
    By

    Atul. A. Joshi,

  • Shailesh P. Palekar,

  1. Research Scholar, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sanjivani College of Engineering, Kopargaon, Maharashtra, India
  2. Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sanjivani College of Engineering, Kopargaon, Maharashtra, India

Abstract

Laminated composite plates are used in aerospace, automotive, and marine industries. They feature great durability against fatigue, a high strength-to-weight ratio, and mechanical attributes that may be altered. However, they are prone to fracture and delamination under complex loading, requiring accurate fracture analysis for structural integrity. Traditional finite element methods (FEM) need extensive mesh refinement for modelling crack propagation which increases the computational costs. The Extended Finite Element Method (XFEM) offers a more efficient alternative by incorporating discontinuous functions into the finite element framework, allowing accurate crack modelling without mesh dependency. The review identifies research gaps and future directions, emphasizing the need for improved XFEM formulations to model matrix cracking, fibre breakage, and delamination. XFEM can be integrated with computational tools like artificial neural network (ANN) for enhanced fracture predictions, aiding researchers in developing efficient predictive models for real-world applications.

Keywords: Laminated composite plates, fracture mechanics, extended finite element method, crack propagation

[This article belongs to International Journal of Fracture Mechanics and Damage Science ]

How to cite this article:
Atul. A. Joshi, Shailesh P. Palekar. Fracture Analysis of Laminated composite plates using Extended Finite Element Method: A Review. International Journal of Fracture Mechanics and Damage Science. 2026; 04(01):16-25.
How to cite this URL:
Atul. A. Joshi, Shailesh P. Palekar. Fracture Analysis of Laminated composite plates using Extended Finite Element Method: A Review. International Journal of Fracture Mechanics and Damage Science. 2026; 04(01):16-25. Available from: https://journals.stmjournals.com/ijfmds/article=2026/view=244572


References

  1. Tsai S. W, “Introduction to Mechanics of Composite Materials, Part II – Theoretical Aspects,” AFML-TR-66-149. Air Force Materials Laboratory, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio (1966).
  2. Tsai S. W. and Wu, E. M. (1971) A general theory of strength for anisotropic materials. Journal of Composite Materials. vol. 5, pp. 58–80
  3. C Sih. and Chen, E.P. (1973) ‘Fracture analysis of unidirectional composites,’ Journal of Composite Materials 7, PP 230–244
  4. Owen, D. R. J., & Fawkes, A. J Engineering fracture mechanics: numerical methods and applications.
  5. Melenk, I. BabuSka.’The partition of unity finite element method: Basic theory and applications Computer Methods in applied mechanics and engineering (1996)- PP289-314
  6. Moës, J. Dolbow and T. Belytschko, A Finite element: for crack growth without remeshing, Int. J. Numerical Methods. Eng., 46 (1999) 131–150.
  7. Milan Jirasek and Thomas Zimmermann :Embedded crack model: I. Basic formulation :. J. Numerical . Methods . Engng 2001; 50: 1269-1290 Int
  8. Sukumar, N., Chopp, D. L., & Moran, B. (2003). Extended finite element method and fast marching method for three-dimensional fatigue crack propagation. Engineering Fracture Mechanics, 70(1), 29–48.
  9. Zi, G., Chen, H., Xu, J., & Belytschko, T. (2005). The extended finite element method for dynamic fractures. Shock and Vibration, 12(1), 9–23.
  10. Liu, X. Y., Xiao, Q. Z., & Karihaloo, B. L. (2004). XFEM for direct evaluation of mixed mode SIFs in homogeneous and bi‐materials. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Engineering, 59(8), 1103–1118.
  11. Nistor, O.Pantale, S. Caperaa on the modeling of dynamic crack propagation by extended finite element method: Numerical implementation in dynela code VIII International Conference on Computational Plasticity Barcelona, 2005
  12. Nobile, L. and Carloni, C., 2005. Fracture analysis for orthotropic cracked plates. Composite Structures, 68, pp. 285–293.
  13. Rethore, A. Gravouil, A. Combescure, A stable numerical scheme for the finite element simulation of dynamic crack propagation with remeshing. Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Engrg. 193 (2004) 4493–4510
  14. Asadpoure, A., Mohammadi, S. and Vafai, A., 2006. Crack analysis in orthotropic media using the extended finite element method. Thin-Walled Structures, 44, pp. 1031–1038
  15. Sukumar, N., Dolbow, J. E., & Moës, N. (2015). Extended finite element method in computational fracture mechanics: a retrospective examination. International Journal of Fracture, 196, 189–206.
  16. Prabel, A. Combescure, A. Gravouil, et al, Level set X-FEM non matching meshes: application to dynamic crack propagation in elastic–plastic media, Int. J. Numer. Methods Engrg. 69 (2007) 1553–1569
  17. P. Fries, A corrected XFEM approximation without problems in blending elements, Int.J. Numer. Methods Engrg. 75 (2008) 503–532
  18. Hettich, T., Hund, A., & Ramm, E. (2008). Modeling of failure in composites by X-FEM and level sets within a multiscale framework. Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering, 197(5), 414–424.
  19. Ebrahimi, S. H., Mohammadi, Asadpoure, A. (2008). An extended finite element (XFEM) approach for crack analysis in composite media. International Journal of Civil Engineering, 6(3), 198–207.
  20. Réthoré, A. Gravouil, A. Combescure, An energy-conserving scheme for dynamic crack growth using the extended finite element method, Int. J. Numer. Methods Engrg. 63 (2005) 631–659.
  21. Giner, E., Sukumar, N., Tarancón, J. E., & Fuenmayor, F. J. (2009). An Abaqus implementation of the extended finite element method. Engineering fracture mechanics, 76(3), 347–368.
  22. Xu, Y., & Yuan, H. (2009). Computational analysis of mixed-mode fatigue crack growth in quasi-brittle materials using extended finite element methods. Engineering Fracture Mechanics, 76(2), 165–181.
  23. Pais, M., & Kim, N. (2009). Modeling failure in composite materials with the extended finite element and level set methods. In 50th AIAA/ASME/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamics, and Materials Conference 17th AIAA/ASME/AHS Adaptive Structures Conference 11th AIAA No (p. 2393).American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
  24. Thomas Menouillard and Ted Belytschko Smoothed nodal forces for improved dynamic crack propagation modeling in XFEM : Int. J. Numer. Meth. Engng 2010; 84:47–72
  25. Motamedi · S. Mohammadi Dynamic crack propagation analysis of orthotropic media by the extended finite element method: Int J Fracture Analysis (2010) 161:21–39
  26. Menouillard, T., Song, J. H., Duan, Q., & Belytschko, T. (2010). Time dependent crack tip enrichment for dynamic crack propagation. International Journal of Fracture, 162, 33–49.
  27. Menouillard, T. Belytschko, Smoothed nodal forces for improved crack propagation modeling in XFEM. Int J for Num. Methods in Eng. 84(2010b) 47–72
  28. Liu, Z. L., Menouillard, T., & Belytschko, T. (2011). An XFEM/Spectral element method for dynamic crack propagation. International Journal of Fracture, 169, 183–198.
  29. Ghorashi, S. S., Mohammadi, S., & Sabbagh-Yazdi, S. R. (2011). Orthotropic enriched element free Galerkin method for fracture analysis of composites. Engineering Fracture Mechanics, 78(9), 1906–1927.
  30. N. Burlayenko a,n, H.Altenbach b, T.Sadowski :An evaluation of displacement-based finite element models used for free vibration analysis of homogeneous and composite plates, Journal of Sound and Vibration
  31. Hattori, G., Rojas-Díaz, R., Sáez, A., Sukumar, N., & García-Sánchez, F. (2012). New anisotropic crack-tip enrichment functions for the extended finite element method. Computational Mechanics, 50, 591–601.
  32. Pourmodheji, R., & Mashayekhi, M. (2012). Improvement of the extended finite element method for ductile crack growth. Materials Science and Engineering: A, 551, 255–271.
  33. Tran, V. X., & Geniaut, S. (2012). Development and industrial applications of X-FEM axisymmetric model for fracture mechanics. Engineering Fracture Mechanics, 82, 135–157.
  34. Tiberkak, R., Bachene, M., Hachi, B. K., Rechak, S., & Haboussi, M. (2009). Dynamic Response of Cracked Plate Subjected to Impact Loading Using the Extended Finite Element Method (X-FEM). Damage and Fracture Mechanics: Failure Analysis of Engineering Materials and Structures, 297–306.
  35. Wang, Y., & Waisman, H. (2015). From diffuse damage to sharp cohesive cracks: A coupled XFEM framework for failure analysis of quasi-brittle materials. Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering, 299, 57–89.
  36. Meek, C., & Ainsworth, R. A. (2015). The effects of load biaxiality and plate length on the limit load of a centre-cracked plate. Engineering Fracture Mechanics, 147, 306–317.
  37. Wu, J. Y., & Li, F. B. (2015). An improved stable XFEM (Is-XFEM) with a novel enrichment function for the computational modelling of cohesive cracks. Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering, 295, 77–107.
  38. Afshar, A. Daneshyar, S. Mohammadi, XFEM analysis of fiber bridging in mixed-mode crack propagation in composites, Compos. Struct. 125 (2015) 314–327
  39. Wen, L., & Tian, R. (2016). Improved XFEM: Accurate and robust dynamic crack growth simulation. Computer methods in applied mechanics and engineering, 308, 256–285.
  40. Baran I, Cinar K, Ersoy N, Akkerman R, Hattel J H (2016) A Review on the Mechanical Modeling of Composite Manufacturing Processes, Archives of Computational Methods in Engineering
  41. Arregui-Mena J D, Margetts L, Mummery P M (2016) Practical Application of the Stochastic Finite Element Method, Archives of Computational Methods in Engineering, 23 (1) 171–190
  42. Kumar, S., Singh, I. V., Mishra, B.K., Sharma, K., Khan, I. A., 2019. A homogenized multigrid XFEM to predict the crack growth behavior of ductile material in the presence of microstructural defects. Engineering Fracture Mechanics, 205, pp. 577-602.
  43. Akhondzadeh, S., Khoei, A. R., & Broumand, P. (2017). An efficient enrichment strategy for modeling stress singularities in isotropic composite materials with X-FEM technique. Engineering Fracture Mechanics, 169, 201-225.
  44. Dey, S., Mukhopadhyay, T., Adhikari, S., Metamodel based high-fidelity stochastic analysis of composite laminates: A concise review with critical comparative assessment, Composite Structures (2017)
  45. Dimitri, R., Fantuzzi, N., Li, Y., & Tornabene, F. (2017). Numerical computation of the crack development and SIF in composite materials with XFEM and SFEM. Composite Structures, 160, 468–490
  46. Higuchi, R., Okabe, T., & Nagashima, T. (2017). Numerical simulation of progressive damage and failure in composite laminates using XFEM/CZM coupled approach. Composites Part A: Applied Science and Manufacturing, 95, 197–207
  47. Yu, T., Bui, T. Q., 2018. Numerical simulation of 2-D weak and strong discontinuities by a novel approach based on XFEM with local mesh refinement. Computers and Structures, 196, pp. 112–133
  48. Bansal, M., Singh, I.V., Mishra, B.K., Bordas, S.P.A., 2019. A parallel and efficient multi-split XFEM for 3-D analysis of heterogeneous materials. Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering, 347, pp. 365–401.
  49. Patil, R.U., Mishra, B.K., Singh, I.V., 2019. A multiscale framework based on phase field method and XFEM to simulate fracture in highly heterogeneous materials. Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics, 100, pp. 390–415
  50. Shailesh, A.Lal : XFEM for Fracture Analysis of Centrally Cracked Laminated Plates Subjected to Biaxial Loads Mechanics of Advanced Composite Structures 8 (2021) 213–234
  51. Suman, S., Dwivedi, K., Anand, S., & Pathak, H. (2022). XFEM–ANN approach to predict the fatigue performance of a composite patch repaired aluminium panel. Composites Part C: Open Access, 9, 100326.
  52. Khoei, A. R. (2015). Extended finite element method: theory and applications. John Wiley & Sons.
Regular Issue Subscription Review Article
Volume 04
Issue 01
Received 13/01/2026
Accepted 21/02/2026
Published 30/03/2026
Publication Time 76 Days
18

Login


My IP

PlumX Metrics