Issue 47

A. Spagnoli et alii, Frattura ed Integrità Strutturale, 47 (2019) 394-400; DOI: 10.3221/IGF-ESIS.47.29 394 Focussed on “Crack Paths” Experimental investigation on the fracture behaviour of natural stone exposed to monotonic and cyclic loading Andrea Spagnoli Department of Engineering and Architecture, Università di Parma, Parma, Italy spagnoli@unipr.it, http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0592-7003 David A. Cendon Franco Departamento de Ciencia de los Materiales, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Madrid, Spain dcendon@mater.upm.es, http://orcid.org/0000-0001-7256-0814 Antonio D’Angelo Department of Engineering and Architecture, Università di Parma, Parma, Italy dangeloa@pizzarotti.it , https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4704-1048 A BSTRACT . The present paper is devoted to an experimental study on the fracture behaviour of natural stones, commonly used as elements for building cladding, under both monotonic and cyclic loading, with particular emphasis to white Carrara marble. The effect of progressive damage produced by in- service thermal fluctuations can be investigated through the application of appropriate cyclic mechanical loads. In the experimental tests conducted, some static mechanical properties of marble are characterized by means of three-point bending tests on edge-cracked prismatic specimens for the determination of Young's modulus, tensile strength and fracture energy. Moreover, cyclic three-point bending tests are conducted to determine the propagation rate of nominally Mode-I fatigue cracks. Finally, the fatigue behaviour of the marble is studied through a cohesive crack model, in which the direct tensile strength of the material is determined by a Brazilian test, and the behaviour is calibrated by means of a suitable FE model. The effect of crack path on the fracture resistance of marble is discussed. K EYWORDS . Fatigue crack propagation; Marble; Quasi-brittle behaviour, Thermal cycles. Citation: Spagnoli, A., Cendon Franco, D. A., D’Angelo, A., Experimental investigation on the fracture behaviour of natural stone exposed to monotonic and cyclic loading, Frattura ed Integrità Strutturale, 47 (2019) 394-400. Received: 25.10.2018 Accepted: 12.11.2018 Published: 01.01.2019 Copyright: © 2019 This is an open access article under the terms of the CC-BY 4.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. I NTRODUCTION he Carrara marble is a widely used material in the construction field, both in historical and monumental buildings and in recent constructions, for example in the cladding elements of ventilated facades [1]. Installed as coating of facades, the marble slabs are exposed to different actions that deteriorate the material, including temperature (daily T