Phase-field approach for fracture prediction of brittle cracked components

•The fracture behavior of brittle materials using the phase-field method is studied.•The characteristic length scale value is determined using the analytical relation.•The phase-field simulation results correlate well with the experimental results.•A study on the effect of various phase-field method formulations is provided.•The proposed phase-field model is proven to be computationally efficient. The versatility of the phase-field method (PFM) in predicting elusive fracture trajectories has attracted researchers in recent years; however, limited focus has been directed toward fracture load prediction for brittle materials. This study presents a computationally low-cost and straightforward framework based on phase-field modeling to predict the fracture loads and fracture initiantion angles of brittle cracked components under in-plane loading conditions. The framework was assessed through a comprehensive comparison between numerical and experimental data for various specimens and test configurations. Despite using 1D analytical formulations for calculating phase-field parameters, great accordance between empirical data and simulation results demonstrated the effectiveness of the proposed model. A technique that restricts the computation of the phase-field variable merely around the crack tip was applied to significantly reduce the computational costs of PFM simulations. Furthermore, we examined different numerical aspects and confirmed the robustness of the proposed procedure.