Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 101 (2019) 200–206

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tafmec

Cutting resistance of soft materials: Effects of blade inclination and friction T

⁎
A. Spagnoli , R. Brighenti, M. Terzano, F. Artoni
Department of Engineering and Architecture, University of Parma, Parco Area delle Scienze 181/A, 43124 Parma, Italy

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: In cutting soft elastic materials, friction is often the most relevant term of the total applied force, and techniques
Cutting to minimise the required effort involve the restraint of frictional dissipation. It is well known from practical
Slicing experience that cutting is made much easier if performed with a combination of slicing and pushing. A slice-push
Soft materials effect, known to reduce the cutting force, can be introduced by skewing the blade with respect to the travelling
Fracture toughness
direction of the blade itself. The observed drop of the required force is connected to the competing dissipative
Friction
contributions, with frictional dissipation being reduced at larger inclination angles. This study reports the results
of several cutting tests on soft elastomeric plates, in which we have recorded the experimental force-displace-
ment curves during the insertion of sharp stainless-steel blades. An energy-based model is employed to discern
the different contributions to the measured force in the various stages of the cutting process, with particular
focus on the steady state initiated after full penetration of the blade. The effects of the inclination angle of the
blade are discussed with respect to the steady state force obtained from the experiments.

1. Introduction
Cutting is a recurrent process in several human activities, from
professional and industrial applications down to the everyday life.
Evolving from its origins in the manufacturing of metals, cutting is now
seen as a peculiar fracture mechanics process, where the fracture en-
ergy is provided by an external tool and separation of the material has
to be obtained with the smallest possible work [1,2]. Soft solids show
peculiar features when it comes to cutting: they can usually be cut with
negligible strain energy, but often high forces are required, due to the
remarkable effect of friction. There are several examples in which
cutting, and other processes strictly connected such as piercing and
puncturing, are applied to determine the mechanical properties of soft
materials, ranging from biological tissues to soft foodstuffs [3–8]. The
role of friction in cutting is a long-debated issue, which in the present
work we are considering both by the point of view of its effect on the
cutting forces and the contribution to the fracture resistance of soft
materials. Friction is usually modelled in terms of the well-known
Coulomb law, in which the frictional dissipation depends on the contact
pressure, but this may not be the most suitable choice for soft materials:
despite little contact pressure between the offcut and the tool, the
frictional force might be relevant. An alternative definition of the
frictional force is based on a constant adhesive shear stress acting along
the whole length of the cut interface [9]. The effect of friction is to give
an apparent enhancement of the fracture resistance of the material
being cut, but it is not easy to separate its contribution from that of the
real material toughness [10,11]. Moreover, because of the large de-
formations taking place locally at tip of the cut material, the fracture
toughness of soft materials cannot be measured adopting the traditional
linear elastic approach of traditional hard solids. In addition, mechan-
ical properties can be rate and temperature dependent, with the limit of
some very soft materials which show a gel-like viscous behaviour [12].
Methods to reduce the cutting forces are sought out in practical appli-
cations, mainly because they allow to obtain a better finish and mini-
mise unwanted damage. One of such methods is to control the frictional
dissipation by altering the contact area between tool and material.
Traditionally, this is what led to the extensive use of wire cutting in
processing cheese or other foodstuff, where the reduction of the contact
area results in a significant drop of the cutting forces and the absence of
waste material [7]. A similar effect on frictional dissipation is obtained
if the workpiece is approached with an inclined blade: in the so-called
oblique cutting, a reduction in the measured force is observed as soon
as the tool is skewed with respect to the cutting direction. Sadly, this is
the principle upon which the guillotine was devised. Atkins and co-
workers [9] showed that a slice-push effect is induced because of the
component of the tool velocity parallel to the edge, and determined the
analytic relationship between the inclination angle and the cutting
force. However, in oblique cutting there is an optimum blade angle
corresponding to the minimum cutting force: this because of the mutual
competition between the reduction of the frictional force, on the one

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: spagnoli@unipr.it (A. Spagnoli).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tafmec.2019.02.017
Accepted 26 February 2019
Available online 01 March 2019
0167-8442/ © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
A. Spagnoli, et al.
hand, and the increase of the work due to out-of-plane deflection at
larger angles, on the other [9]. A detailed study on oblique cutting,
applied to stacked paper sheets, is provided in [13], where an energy-
based analysis of cutting is combined with finite element simulations. In
the present work, which represents an extension of a previous study on
cutting of thin polymeric sheets [14], we are considering the issue of
the frictional effects in relation to the fracture resistance and cutting
forces in soft elastomeric materials. Experimental indentation-cutting
tests of elastomeric thin-plated specimens are performed, using a rigid
sharp symmetric blade that penetrates under different rates and in-
clination angles. Following the initial indentation, the steady state of
cutting is described by means of an energetic balance equation, which
includes the following terms: (i) the frictional work; (ii) the strain en-
ergy contribution, and (iii) the work of fracture. With respect to the
latter term, a discussion on how to determine the fracture resistance of
soft elastic materials is presented, according to the concept of a critical
tearing energy introduced by Rivlin [15–17]. An observation of the
force vs penetration displacement recorded during the tests confirms
the influence of the inclination angle, although at larger angle the re-
sponse is controversial: possibly, three-dimensional effects caused by
the inclination of the crack front might influence the steady state
evolution of the crack path during the penetration. The paper is
structured as follows: Section 2 is devoted to the presentation of the
basic concepts of cutting and its connection with a fracture mechanics
approach, tackled with energetic considerations. In Section 3 we con-
sider the case of oblique cutting, presenting the definition of the so-
called slice-push ratio and the analytic relationship with the cutting
force. Section 4 is devoted to the presentation of the experimental re-
sults, concerning the force versus penetration curves and the results for
the oblique cutting. Finally, Section 5 outlines some concluding re-
marks.
2. Cutting and fracture mechanics
2.1. The energetic approach to cutting
An energy-based description of cutting can be derived directly from
the well-known relationships of fracture mechanics [8]. Below, we
describe the main stages of cutting through the thickness of an elastic
plate with a thin rigid blade (Fig. 1), and provide the equation of the
energetic balance, written in incremental form.
The first stage consists in the initial indentation of the material:
generally, in elastic solids it is a fully reversible process, that can be
described using simplified contact mechanic models, such for instance
those related to the indentation of an elastic substrate by means of a
wedge-shaped tip [18,19]. The extent of the deformation, as well as the
force corresponding to initial failure, depend on the elastic modulus of
the material and on the tool sharpness: from experimental evidence,
blunt tools require higher forces [20] than sharp blades. Following
failure and relaxation of the material, the tool advances under in-
creasing force, because the contact area expands as the material travels
along the sides. Once that full penetration is achieved, the force stops
increasing: this point marks the beginning of the third stage, usually
defined as the steady state of cutting.
Let us consider the above-mentioned third stage of cutting: as-
suming that the increment da of cut length is equal to increment of
penetration displacement dD , we can express the external work done by
the cutting force as dWext = F da . Such work is consumed by three dif-
ferent dissipative contributions, due to the strain energy, the work of
fracture and the frictional dissipation, so that the general energy bal-
ance equation takes the following form:
dWext = dUS + dUG + d Uf (1)
where dUS is the elastic strain energy contribution, dUG is the work of
fracture and dUf is the energy dissipated because of the frictional forces
acting at the tool-material interface.
201
Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 101 (2019) 200–206
Incidentally, frictional dissipation is often the most relevant con-
tribution of the energetic balance. In the contact of soft materials with
rigid tools, the model of adhesive friction offers a suitable approxima-
tion, assuming a constant shear stress τf (irrespectively of the existing
normal stress) acting over the contact length on each face of the blade.
The increment of frictional work is:
dUf = 2ltτf dv (2)
where dv is the displacement increment in the cutting direction, l is the
length of the contact zone, t is the plate thickness and the factor 2 ac-
counts for both sides of the tool-material contact (see Fig. 2).
In floppy materials displaying a low bending resistance, the con-
tribution of the elastic energy to the dissipation is usually negligible,
unless a pre-existent stress state exists in the material. For instance,
stretching normally to the cutting path results in lower cutting forces,
because the strain energy directly feeds the propagation of the cut.
Often in the cutting experiments, a state of compression exists because
of the clamping system of the testing rig. From some previous experi-
mental computations, it was found that the strain energy contribution is
one order of magnitude lower than frictional dissipation [14], therefore
dUs is ignored in the present work.
The work of fracture is generally referred to the energy available G,
per increase of unit of fracture surface, so that we can write:
dUG = Gt da (3)
The critical condition for propagation of a cut in the steady state is
obtained by differentiation of Eq. (1), assuming dUS = 0 and expressing
dUf as in Eq. (2):
F
− 2lτf = GC
t (4)
where GC is the fracture resistance of the material.
2.2. Fracture resistance of soft materials
In soft materials, defining the fracture resistance is a critical task. As
the zone of large deformation might be significant, linear elastic frac-
ture mechanics (LEFM) relationships generally do not hold, and thus
the definition of the fracture resistance cannot be related to the stress
intensity factor, as it is commonly done for hard brittle solids. In a series
of pioneering works on fracture of natural rubbers, Rivlin introduced a
new definition of a critical energy for rupture, denoted the tearing en-
ergy of the material [15]. For elastic materials, such energy is analogous
to the well-known concept of the critical energy release rate of LEFM,
thus we can compute the fracture resistance GC using the test config-
urations devised for the tearing energy of rubbers. In the present work,
we have used the so-called single-edge crack test, according to which
the critical energy is defined as [16]:
6
GC = W (λ c ) a
λc (5)
Differently from LEFM, the fracture resistance is obtained as func-
tion of the strain energy density (SED) W of the material, in corre-
spondence of the stretch λ c at which the specimen tears. The tearing
stretch λ c generally depends on the length a of the initial cut, offering
an indirect measure of the flaw sensitivity of the material. The testing
procedure consists in performing several tensile tests on single edge
cracked specimens, with different lengths of the initial cut, and then
average the results to obtain a measure of the fracture resistance
(Fig. 3).
An alternative method has been proposed by several authors (see,
for instance, McCarthy et al. [20]): the fracture energy is computed
directly from a cutting experiment, inverting Eq. (4). A compensation of
the frictional contribution is obtained by a double run of the blade in
the specimen, the second time following the open cut, i.e. by fictitiously
cutting the already cut material. In this fashion, we can assume that the
A. Spagnoli, et al. Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 101 (2019) 200–206

Fig. 1. Typical experimental load-deflection curve of an indentation cutting through the thickness of an elastic plate. The following stages are illustrated: 1, initial
indentation, with failure in correspondence of the depth Di ; 2, cut propagation under increasing force; 3, steady state after full penetration of the cutting tool, of
length l.

Fig. 2. (a) Model of oblique cutting of an elastic plate by means of a thin blade. The cutting tool moves in the material along a direction parallel to the plate and is
inclined at an angle β . Inset shows the tip cross-section geometry of the blade, with the adhesive shear stress τf . (b) Variation of the dimensionless cutting force as a
function of the slice-push ratio, for different values of the parameter η (Eq. (10a)). η = 3 is the approximate value that we have used in the experiments (Section 4).

work of fracture is null, thus only the frictional work remains. one that is parallel [8]. Such components are (see Fig. 2):

V = F cosβ H = F sinβ (6)

3. Oblique cutting
H
with the slice-push ratio defined as: ξ = V = tanβ .
In this section we introduce the model of oblique cutting, in which Following the formulation presented by Atkins et al. [9] in the case
an inclined tool cuts through the thickness of an elastic plate. When a of frictionless slice-push cutting, and neglecting the strain energy dis-
thin blade, whose normal forms an angle β with the direction of its sipation, the energetic balance in the steady state is obtained from Eq.
motion, cuts through a workpiece, a slice-push effect is induced. (1):
Indeed, the cutting force F, acting along the direction of motion, has
two components, one that is perpendicular to the edge of the blade, and V dv + H dh = GC teff dv (7)

202
A. Spagnoli, et al. Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 101 (2019) 200–206

Fig. 3. (a) Schematic representation of the single-edge crack test, for measurement of the fracture energy GC . Average dimensions of the specimens used in the tests
are w0 = 25 mm, H0 = 85 mm . (b) Experimental curves of nominal stress vs stretch, and SED vs stretch in the sound specimen. The coloured values on the plot are the
critical values of the stretch λ = 1 + 2Δ/ H0 , corresponding to the tearing of the specimens with different initial cut lengths a. (For interpretation of the references to
color in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

where the term on the left is the external work. The contribution is due curves of the cutting force vs slice push ratio are shown. We can observe
both to the normal force (by a displacement dv) and to the parallel force that at higher values of η, corresponding to higher friction, the cutting
(by a displacement dh). The symbol teff indicates the effective thickness force is larger. This means that the cut resistance of the material is
of the specimen, equal to t / cosβ . Friction can be easily included by enhanced by friction.
adding the frictional dissipation to the right side of Eq. (7). The fric- The effect of the blade tip angle θ , which might be relevant for
tional force acts in the direction of the resulting displacement, and is wedge cutting, is included by slightly modifying Eq. (10a), although
defined as: with thin blades the effect is almost irrelevant [1]:
Ff = 2lteff τf (8) F GC
=
⎛ 2 ⎛θ ⎞ + ξ2⎞
⎜1 + η sec ⎟
or, in terms of its components, GC teff 1 + ξ2 ⎝ ⎝2⎠ ⎠ (12)
1 ξ
Vf = 2lteff τf Hf = 2lteff τf
1 + ξ2 1 + ξ2 (9) 4. Experimental results

Combining Eqs. (5)–(7), we obtain the expression of the resultant 4.1. Materials and methods
cutting force and of its components V and H, normalised with respect to
the effective plate thickness teff : We have performed a number of cutting and fracture tests, using
(V − Vf )2 + (H − Hf )2 thin-plated silicone specimens (Fig. 4). The specimens were prepared
F 1
= =η+ in-house, using a commercial silicone rubber (Zhermack Dental Elite
GC teff GC teff 1 + ξ2 (10a) Double 32). The preparation followed the prescriptions of the producer,
and the specimens were allowed at least 24 h of resting time, in order to
V η 1
= + ensure a full polymerization of the network chains. Temperature fluc-
GC teff 1 + ξ2 1 + ξ2 (10b) tuations between different tests were not significant (no relative hu-
midity control was made in the experiments). Specimens for cutting
H ⎛ η 1 ⎞ experiments were rectangular plates of length 57 mm, width 40 mm and
= ξ⎜ +
GC teff 1 + ξ 2 1 + ξ2 ⎟ (10c) thickness 6 mm. The cutting tool was a commercial stainless steel cutter
⎝ ⎠
blade (no specification on roughness parameters of the blade surface
In Eq. (10a), we have introduced the variable η to indicate the ratio was available), with the following dimensions: wedge angle θ = 20°,
between the adhesive shear stress and the fracture resistance of the blade length l = 18 mm (see Fig. 2a). The tool has been replaced after
material. It is defined as: each test, in order to have the same sharpness. We have mounted the
2lτf cutting tool on a rigid frame, and applied displacements at a quasi-static
η= rate of 0.1–1 mm/s, measuring the reaction force with an external load
GC (11)
cell. The application of higher blade penetration rates is beyond the
Firstly, we notice that in frictionless cutting η = 0 , hence, from Eq. scope of the present paper.
(10a), F = GC teff / 1 + ξ 2 = GC t , confirming that the blade angle exerts Tensile tests for material characterisation were performed on dog-
no effect on the cutting forces if friction is not taken into account. Then, shaped specimens, subjected to uniaxial tension, and the resulting
we can explore the influence of η on the cutting force. In Fig. 2b, three stress-stretch curves were fitted with hyperelastic incompressible

203
A. Spagnoli, et al.
Fig. 4. The experimental set-up of the cutting tests, showing the beginning of
the test and an intermediate stage, in which the silicone plate is indented by the
orthogonal blade.
constitutive laws. In the range of interest (stretch λ < 1.5), a good fit is
obtained with the single-parameter neo-Hookean law, with the shear
modulus μ = 0.46 MPa.
Fracture testing has been performed according to the procedure
outlined in Section 2.2. The specimens were rectangular plates of
average length 80 mm, width 25 mm and thickness 4.5 mm, with edge
crack lengths ranging from 0 to 5 mm. A fracture resistance
GC = 1.02 kJ/m2 was obtained.
In order to get an estimation of the adhesive shear stress τf , we have
performed a specific cutting test with a double run of the blade in the
specimen, similarly to the test illustrated in Fig. 4. The second run of
the blade is made following the open cut: neglecting the strain energy
contribution, and being the fracture work null, we can assume that the
force is only due to friction. Therefore, from Eq. (4) we have:
Ff
τf =
2tl
where Ff is the average value of the steady state force, with the sub-
script f indicating that this force is due to friction only. From various
tests, we have found an adhesive shear stress falling within the range
70–80 kPa, and using Eq. (11), we have obtained η ≈ 3.
4.2. Results with orthogonal blade
The first results we present are related to the typical case of in-
dentation-cutting with an orthogonal blade (β = 0 °). We have measured
the reaction force during the whole penetration, up to a depth of ap-
proximately 30 mm, that is enough for full penetration and beginning of
the steady state. Various tests were performed under the same condi-
tions, showing good repeatability. Some scatter was noticed in certain
tests, probably due to small differences in the clamping torque and
temperature fluctuations. In order to distinguish the different stages of
cutting, we have also computed the slope of the force-displacement
curve. In particular, we have calculated the stiffness as a moving
average of the tangent at each point of the curve.
The results are shown in Fig. 5. The red thicker line plots the nor-
malised cutting force F/t versus the penetration displacement D. The
curve rises initially in a non-linear manner, up to a depth of approxi-
mately 3.5 mm: this point corresponds to the first failure with formation
of a cut. Evidence is more visible from the stiffness curve, where failure
is marked by a significant drop in the stiffness. In the following stage,
the blade advances in the material with the force increasing almost
Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 101 (2019) 200–206
Fig. 5. Experimental indentation cutting with orthogonal blade (β = 0 °). The
red thicker line shows the normalised force-displacement curve for the blade
advancing in the sound material, while the blue thinner line is related to a
second pass, following the open cut. Here we assume that the measured force Ff
is only due to friction. The dashed line is the stiffness-displacement curve of the
first pass. (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the
reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
linearly, and the stiffness showing some fluctuations around a mean
value. It appears that the cut propagation occurs in a stable manner,
with the tool tip always touching the tip of the cut (refer to Spagnoli
et al.[14] for a detailed explanation). At a depth approximately equal to
D = Di + l , the blade has fully penetrated the specimen, and the force
stabilises at a constant, slightly decreasing value. It is the beginning of
the steady state cutting, with the stiffness curve dropping to zero. The
blue thinner line is related to a second pass of the blade, following the
open cut. The force is due approximately only to friction, and the dis-
(13)
tance between the curves remains constant after the initial indentation.
4.3. Effect of blade inclination angle
Here we consider the effect of the blade inclination angle on the
cutting force. In Fig. 6a, the measured normalised force F/t is plotted
against the applied displacements D. We have considered 3 different
values of the blade inclination, corresponding to β = 10, 20, 30°. Notice
that the sign of the inclination angle has no effect on the magnitude of
the forces. The case of the orthogonal blade (β = 0°) is added as a
comparison. From the plots we can see that the angle has an effect on
the cutting forces, although rather small. In particular, we consider the
average force measured after the onset of the steady state: as expected
from the model described in Section 3, the angle has the effect of re-
ducing the cutting force, because of the induced slicing action. How-
ever, we could not identify a regular trend: we notice that a small blade
angle tended to reduce the measured forces, but larger angles caused a
relatively smaller reduction. This is probably due to the out-of-plane
deformation occurring in the sample, induced by the parallel compo-
nent H of the cutting force, which grows with the angle.
The same effect is captured in Fig. 6b, where we illustrate the trends
of the steady state cutting forces as a function of the slice-push ratio ξ .
The black dashed curve plots the theoretical resultant force, i.e. in the
travel direction of the blade, which displays a decrease in the di-
mensionless force with an increasing slice-push ratio. The other curves
refer to the normal/pushing force and the parallel/slicing force: while
204
A. Spagnoli, et al.
Fig. 6. (a) The normalised cutting force as obtained from the experimental tests, for different values of the blade angle β . The arrow marks the beginning of the steady
state with constant force. (b) Steady state cutting forces versus the applied slice-push ratio. The curves are obtained from the model of oblique cutting, Eqs.
(10a)–(10c), where η ≈ 3. In the enlarged view, the open circles indicate the resultant forces F obtained from the experimental curves.
the former decreases constantly, the latter seems to peak at a critical
ratio, and then decreases [9]. In the enlarged view we consider only the
region of interest: notably, the slice-push ratio in our tests changes
between ξ = 0 (corresponding to β = 0°) and ξ = 1 (for β = 45°).
Larger ratio are accomplished, for instance, by adding a slicing motion
of the cutting tool. The open circles mark the cutting forces obtained
from the experimental curves and averaged at the steady state. We
notice that the trend at large angles does not agree with the theoretical
predictions. In fact, larger inclination angles induce a non-negligible
deflection of the thin plate, so that part of the external work is spent to
elastically bend the specimen and is not available to the cutting process.
This secondary effect has not been considered in elaborating the tests
results because of the difficulty in quantifying the bending energy of the
partially cut plate. For larger cutting angles, the results shown in Fig. 6b
might overestimate the effective cutting force; however, since in real
cases of cutting the out-of-plane displacements are difficult to constrain,
the actual cutting force must include such a contribution. According to
the above observation, when out-of-plane bending is not negligible,
there exists an optimal cutting angle leading to the minimum steady
state cutting force. Such an optimal angle obviously depends on the
geometry, the elastic properties and the boundary conditions of the cut
sheet.
5. Conclusions
In the present paper we have considered the experimental and
theoretical study of the mechanics of indentation-cutting of soft elas-
tomers. The theoretical model, based on an energetic incremental for-
mulation, is validated through cutting tests on thin-plated specimen,
performed with commercial steel cutting tools.
Cutting soft elastic materials, such as the silicone rubbers used in
our experiments, is a process where a great part of the required cutting
force is dissipated because of friction. In our model, we have described
friction through an adhesive constant shear stress, a description which
205
Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 101 (2019) 200–206
is more suitable than the pressure-dependent Coulomb’s law. We have
also addressed the issue of the fracture resistance of soft materials,
where the large strain region around the tip of the cut is relevant. The
fracture resistance of such materials is defined according to the concept
of a critical energy, corresponding to the complete tearing of a cracked
specimen.
Reduction of the required force for cutting is of interest in many
fields, for instance in the food industry and in surgery, where soft tis-
sues can be damaged severely by higher forces. Oblique cutting is a
well-known technique that, within certain limits, can be used to achieve
a reduction of the required force, thanks to a fictitious slicing action due
to the blade angle. Significantly, this so-called slice-push effect is
bonded to the frictional dissipation. In our tests, we have explored
different blade inclination angles, and measured the cutting force at the
steady state. The experimental results show the decrease of the cutting
force by introducing an angle, but the trend is not confirmed at larger
angles, suggesting that there might exist an optimal cutting angle cor-
responding the lowest cutting force.
References
[1] B. Cotterell, Fracture and Life, Imperial College Press, London, 2010.
[2] A.G. Atkins, Modelling metal cutting using modern ductile fracture mechanics:
quantitative explanations for some longstanding problems, Int. J. Mech. Sci. 45 (2)
(2003) 373–396, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0020-7403(03)00040-7.
[3] A.G. Atkins, J.F.V. Vincent, An instrumented microtome for improved histological
sections and the measurement of fracture toughness, J. Mater. Sci. Lett. 3 (4) (1984)
310–312, https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00729381.
[4] J.F.V. Vincent, G. Jeronimidis, A.A. Khan, H. Luyten, The wedge fracture test. A
new method for measurement of food texture, J. Texture Stud. 22 (1) (1991) 45–57,
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-4603.1991.tb00005.x.
[5] C.F. Doran, B.A.O. McCormack, A. Macey, A simplified model to determine the
contribution of strain energy in the failure process of thin biological membranes
during cutting, Strain 40 (4) (2004) 173–179, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-
1305.2004.00165.x.
[6] T. Brown, S.J. James, G.L. Purnell, Cutting forces in foods: experimental measure-
ments, J. Food Eng. 70 (2) (2005) 165–170, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfoodeng.
2004.09.022.
A. Spagnoli, et al.
[7] S.M. Goh, M.N. Charalambides, J.G. Williams, On the mechanics of wire cutting of
cheese, Eng. Fract. Mech. 72 (6) (2005) 931–946, https://doi.org/10.1016/J.
ENGFRACMECH.2004.07.015.
[8] A.G. Atkins, The Science and Engineering of Cutting: The Mechanics and Processes
of Separating, Scratching and Puncturing Biomaterials, Metals and Non-metals,
Butterworth-Heinemann/Elsevier, Oxford, 2009.
[9] A.G. Atkins, X. Xu, G. Jeronimidis, Cutting, by pressing and slicing, of thin floppy
slices of materials illustrated by experiments on cheddar cheese and salami, J.
Mater. Sci. 39 (8) (2004) 2761–2766, https://doi.org/10.1023/B:JMSC.
0000021451.17182.86.
[10] A.G. Atkins, Toughness and cutting: a new way of simultaneously determining
ductile fracture toughness and strength, Eng. Fract. Mech. 72 (6) (2005) 849–860,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.engfracmech.2004.07.014.
[11] J.G. Williams, Friction and plasticity effects in wedge splitting and cutting fracture
tests, J. Mater. Sci. 33 (22) (1998) 5351–5357, https://doi.org/10.1023/
A:1004490015211.
[12] P.D. Dunn, J.D. Burton, X. Xu, A.G. Atkins, Paths swept out by initially slack flexible
wires when cutting soft solids; when passing through a very viscous medium; and
during regelation, Proc. Roy. Soc. Lond. A: Math. Phys. Eng. Sci. 463 (2007) 1–20,
https://doi.org/10.1098/rspa.2006.1747.
[13] K.R. Deibel, C. Raemy, K. Wegener, Modeling slice-push cutting forces of a sheet
stack based on fracture mechanics, Eng. Fract. Mech. 124-125 (2014) 234–247,
206
Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 101 (2019) 200–206
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.engfracmech.2014.04.029.
[14] A. Spagnoli, M. Terzano, R. Brighenti, F. Artoni, P. Ståhle, The fracture mechanics
in cutting: a comparative study on hard and soft polymeric materials, Int. J. Mech.
Sci. 148 (2018) 554–564, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijmecsci.2018.09.013.
[15] R.S. Rivlin, A.G. Thomas, Rupture of rubber. I. Characteristic energy for tearing, J.
Polym. Sci. 10 (3) (1953) 291–318, https://doi.org/10.1002/pol.1953.120100303.
[16] H.W. Greensmith, Rupture of rubber. X. The change in stored energy on making a
small cut in a test piece held in simple extension, J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 7 (3) (1963)
993–1002, https://doi.org/10.1002/app.1963.070070316.
[17] G.J. Lake, O.H. Yeoh, Measurement of rubber cutting resistance in the absence of
friction, Int. J. Fract. 14 (5) (1978) 509–526, https://doi.org/10.1007/
BF01390472.
[18] C.E. Truman, A. Sackfield, D.A. Hills, Contact mechanics of wedge and cone in-
denters, Int. J. Mech. Sci. 37 (3) (1995) 261–275, https://doi.org/10.1016/0020-
7403(94)00066-S.
[19] M. Ciavarella, D.A. Hills, G. Monno, Contact problems for a wedge with rounded
apex, Int. J. Mech. Sci. 40 (10) (1998) 977–988, https://doi.org/10.1016/S0020-
7403(97)00141-0.
[20] C. McCarthy, M. Hussey, M.D. Gilchrist, On the sharpness of straight edge blades in
cutting soft solids: Part I – indentation experiments, Eng. Fract. Mech. 74 (14)
(2007) 2205–2224, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.engfracmech.2006.10.015.