Thermodynamic based model for the evolution equation of the backstress in cyclic plasticity

A nonlinear kinematic hardening rule is developed here within the framework of thermodynamic principles. The derived kinematic hardening evolution equation has three distinct terms: two strain hardening terms and a dynamic recovery term that operates at all times. The proposed hardening rule, which is referred in this paper as the FAPC (Fredrick and Armstrong–Phillips–Chaboche) kinematic hardening rule, shows a combined form of the Frederick and Armstrong backstress evolution equation, Phillips evolution equation, and Chaboche series rule. A new term is incorporated into the Frederick and Armstrong evolution equation that appears to have agreement with the experimental observations that show the motion of the center of the yield surface in the stress space is directed between the gradient to the surface at the stress point and the stress rate direction at that point. The model is further modified in order to simulate nonproportional cyclic hardening by proposing a measure representing the degree of nonproportionality of loading. This measure represents the topology of the incremental stress path. Numerically, it represents the angle between the current stress increment and the previous stress increment, which is interpreted through the material constants of the kinematic hardening evolution equation. This new kinematic hardening rule is incorporated in a material constitutive model based on the von Mises plasticity type and the Chaboche isotropic hardening type. Numerical integration of the incremental elasto-plastic constitutive equations is based on a simple semi-implicit return-mapping algorithm and the full Newton–Raphson iterative method is used to solve the resulting nonlinear equations. Experimental simulations are conducted for proportional and non-proportional cyclic loadings. The model shows good correlation with the experimental results.