Publications

Size Effect in Continuum Modeling

Foulk, James W.; Connelly, Kevin C.; Song, Bo S.; Yang, Nancy Y.; Lu, Wei-Yang L.

The mechanical properties of some materials (Cu, Ni, Ag, etc.) have been shown to develop strong dependence on the geometric dimensions, resulting in a size effect. Several theories have been proposed to model size effects, but have been based on very few experiments conducted at appropriate scales. Some experimental results implied that size effects are caused by increasing strain gradients and have been used to confirm many strain gradient theories. On the other hand, some recent experiments show that a size effect exists in the absence of strain gradients. This report describes a brief analytical and experimental study trying to clarify the material and experimental issues surrounding the most influential size-effect experiments by Fleck et al (1994). This effort is to understand size effects intended to further develop predictive models.