Saint–Venant torsion of a circular bar with radial cracks incorporating surface elasticity

The Saint–Venant torsion problem of a circular cylinder containing a radial crack with surface elasticity is studied. The surface elasticity is incorporated into the crack faces by using the continuum-based surface/interface model of Gurtin and Murdoch. Both an internal crack and an edge crack are considered. By using the Green’s function method, the boundary value problem is reduced to a Cauchy singular integro-differential equation of the first order, which can be numerically solved by using the Gauss–Chebyshev integration formula, the Chebyshev polynomials and the collocation method. Due to the incorporation of surface elasticity, the stresses exhibit the logarithmic singularity at the crack tips. The torsion problem of a circular cylinder containing two symmetric collinear radial cracks of equal length with surface elasticity is also solved by using a similar method. The strengths of the logarithmic singularity and the size-dependent torsional rigidity are calculated.