Interior-stress fields produced by a general axisymmetric punch

This work is a supplement to the work of Sneddon on axisymmetric Boussinesq problem in 1965 in which the distributions of interior-stress fields are derived here for a punch with general profile. A novel set of mathematical procedures is introduced to process the basic elastic solutions (obtained by the method of Hankel transform, which was pioneered by Sneddon) and the solution of the dual integral equations. These processes then enable us to not only derive the general relationship of indentation depth D and total load P that acts on the punch but also explicitly obtain the general analytical expressions of the stress fields beneath the surface of an isotropic elastic half-space. The usually known cases of punch profiles are reconsidered according to the general formulas derived in this study, and the deduced results are verified by comparing them with the classical results. Finally, these general formulas are also applied to evaluate the von Mises stresses for several new punch profiles.