A series of frozen stress experiments were conducted on surface flaws of varying aspect ratios in pressurized cylinder with star-shaped cutout in order to study the stress intensity factor distribution along the flaw border and to estimate the loss of the inverse square root singularity when the crack border intersects the inner star surface at right angles. By applying a refined optical method, the photoelastic data are converted into classical stress intensity factors resulting from the three dimensional stress state existing at the inner surface and compared with a numerical analysis to indicate the nearly uniform distribution of the stress intensity factor along the crack border. Based upon this result a two dimensional weight function approach is demonstrated to yield accurate values of the maximum stress intensity factor for the motor grain test geometry. / Ph. D.