Competition between the buckling-driven delamination and wrinkling in compressed thin coatings

The competition between two common failure modes of a thin coating under in-plane compression, the surface wrinkling and the buckling-driven delamination, is studied to assess the critical strain when the mechanical instability may occur at given geometrical and material parameters. A buckling map is constructed based on results of a finite element analysis, which relates the critical applied strain for the onset of instability to the interface adhesion and elastic properties of materials. An approximate scaling relation is derived for the energy release rate of buckling-driven delamination of a coating deposited on a compliant substrate. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.