Loading Devices and Non-classical Boundary Conditions

We review some works on non-classical boundary conditions, and loading devices inspired by discussions with late Professor J.L. Ericksen. For a circular contact area between a body and a linearly elastic, isotropic and homogeneous half space as a loading device, we estimate the constant in the classical Winkler’s expression of the normal surface traction at a point of the contact region in terms of the normal to the surface displacement of the same point. We also provide expressions for the tangential tractions at points of the common interface between the body and the loading device. The surface tractions are in general functionals of the contact surface displacements and their tangential derivatives. It is shown that many boundary conditions fall outside the usual definition of natural boundary conditions and may require special treatments in numerically solving boundary-value problems.