Spherical ceramic pebbles subjected to multiple non-concentrated surface loads

This paper presents an analytical solution for the stress distributions within spherical ceramic pebbles subjected to multiple surface loads along different directions. The method of solution employs a displacement approach together with the Fourier associated Legendre expansion for piecewise boundary loads. The solution corresponds to spherically isotropic elastic spheres. The classical solution for isotropic spheres subjected diametral point loads is recovered as a special case of our solution. For the isotropic pebbles under consideration, stresses within spheres are numerically evaluated. The results show that the number of loads does have significant influence on the maximum tensile stress inside the sphere. Moreover, the applicability of solutions using the series expansion method for stresses near surface load areas is also examined. The stresses evaluated with large enough number of terms agree quite well with those derived from FEM simulations, except around the edge of circle load area.