Papers by Keyword: Fatigue Strength

Abstract: For research on comprehensive performance of crankshaft in piston compressor, multi-body dynamics model was built to get mechanical boundary conditions of the crankshaft, and the fatigue strength was verified; Finite element model (FEM) of the crankshaft was established, and the 1^st 6 modal of the crankshaft was obtained. The results showed that fatigue strength and dynamic characteristic of the crankshaft was qualified. Theoretical basis could be provided for optimize the crankshaft’s structure by fatigue strength and modal analysis.

Abstract: β-type titanium alloys such as a Ti–29Nb–13Ta–4.6Zr alloy (TNTZ) are potential candidates for next-generation metallic biomaterials. However, the mechanical strength of β-type titanium alloys with a single β phase is not enough to be approved as materials for fabricating medical implant devices that are subjected to heavy loads, such as a spinal fixation device. Therefore, β-type titanium alloys are often subjected to aging treatments in order to improve their mechanical strength through precipitation hardening. However, β-type titanium alloys exhibit a heterogeneous microstructure because of microscale elemental segregation. In this study, the heterogeneous microstructure caused by the microsegregation of secondary phases was characterized by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) in TNTZ subjected to aging treatments. Furthermore, the influence of the heterogeneous distribution of secondary phases in TNTZ on mechanical properties was revealed by comparing its properties to the homogeneously structured TNTZ subjected to long-term homogenization.

Abstract: In the paper fatigue specimens are extracted from different regions of cast aluminum cylinder heads produced by two foundries. A high strength region and a low strength region were identified within the cylinder head and the A356-T6 material locally characterized in terms of microstructure and defect population. High cycle fatigue testing according to a reduced staircase method was performed to determine the local fatigue strength at 10⁷ cycles in the cylinder heads of the two foundries. The implications of the experimental observations are discussed.

Abstract: Laser surface hardening is an advanced method of surface treatment of structural steels with a great potential for wide industrial applications. According to the recent literature results and knowledge about laser hardening, fatigue resistance can be either reduced or increased, even considerably, depending on numerous parameters of basic material, the technology parameters etc. This contribution contains results of a partial study of effect of laser hardening of relatively small specimens on fatigue resistance of 42CrMo4 steel. Two different parameters of laser hardening were used, one of them resulted in considerable longitudinal residual stresses surface speed of laser beam 4 mm/s. Results of fatigue tests of basic reference material had a surprisingly high, atypical scatter, particularly in the region near fatigue limit. Fractographical analyses indicated that this scatter was connected with presence of single inclusions, even quite large, which in some cases caused fatigue crack initiation. Compressive residual stresses after the laser treatment improved fatigue strength and reduced the scatter, likely due to short crack retardation in the compressive residuals tress field. Further analyses and discussion are provided using Murakami method of fatigue life evaluation of materials containing defects.

Abstract: Microstructure and pre-existing surface flaws in smooth notch geometries significantly affect the fatigue life of welded joints. Traditionally, a welded joint is assumed to incorporate crack-like defects and the crack propagation dominates the total fatigue life. For a smooth weld notch geometry, the macro crack initiation period becomes more significant, and this difference cannot be modelled with the existing stress or fracture mechanics ‑based approaches. In this paper, a microstructure and strain ‑based fatigue life approach is presented. In the approach, the fatigue damage process is modelled as a repeated crack initiation process within a material volume related to the microstructure. The novelty of the developed approach is that the size of the damage zone is defined from the grain size statistics without using fracture mechanics. The approach is able to consider the changes in the stress gradient, stress triaxiality and plasticity during the fatigue crack initiation and growth. The developed approach has been validated with experiments on submerged-arc and laser-hybrid welded joints. The predicted fatigue life, crack growth path and rate showed good agreement with the experiments. For a welded joint with smooth and favourable notch shape, the short crack growth, i.e. macro crack initiation period is dominant and it has a significant influence on the fatigue life.

Abstract: To improve the fatigue properties of structural steel, a novel surface modification process which combines high-frequency induction heating (IH) with fine particle peening (FPP) was developed. IH-FPP treatment was performed on the surface of structural steel specimens (0.45%C) at temperatures from 600 to 750 °C, with peening times of 60 and 120 s. To determine the characteristics of the treated surfaces, the microstructure was observed using an optical microscope and a scanning electron microscope. Vickers hardness and residual stress distributions were also measured. The characteristics of fine-grained microstructures were examined by electron backscatter diffraction. Furthermore, in order to investigate the effect of the grain refinement achieved by IH-FPP treatment, rotational bending fatigue tests were performed on treated specimens. Results showed that IH-FPP treatment created fine-grained microstructures beneath the surfaces of steel samples. The average ferrite grain size was 4.06 μm for a treatment temperature of 700 °C, and finally 0.76 μm for 600 °C . This was due to dynamic recrystallization in the processed region. IH-FPP treated specimens exhibited a higher fatigue strength than untreated specimens. As almost no compressive residual stress was measured in the treated or untreated specimens, the increase in fatigue strength resulting from IH-FPP treatment was due solely to grain refinement.

Abstract: A common opinion is that cast iron, especially grey cast iron, is not as notch sensitive as steel and has therefore not been treated by shot peening to suppress crack initiation. For a heterogeneous material that also is brittle, just like grey cast iron, the shot peening parameters needed to induce beneficial surface residual stresses can be problematic to identify. Fatigue testing under uniaxial loading with an R value of -1, on mechanically polished and shot peened specimens, has been performed to determine the fatigue strength at 10⁷ cycles as well as complete Wöhler-curves. Two different types of specimen geometries were tested, one smooth and one notched specimen having k_t equal to 1.05 resp. 1.33. With large shots and high peening intensity (heavy SP) the fatigue strength clearly decreased whereas small shots and low peening intensity (gentle SP) might have lowered the fatigue strength. A short annealing at 285° after gentle shot peening increased the fatigue strength. The results are discussed and explained based on x-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements, i.e. residual stress and full width at half maximum profiles, as well as microstructural investigations using scanning electron microscope (SEM).

Abstract: Martensitic high-carbon high-strength SAE 52100 bearing steel is one of the main alloys used as the principal alloys for rolling contact applications. We developed a novel repeated quenching method by induction heating in order to enhance the materials strength. The steel bar passed through the heated coil several times and finally quenched by cooling water. The rotating bending fatigue tests was done in order to investigate the fatigue strength of the steel bars. The heat affected zone (HAZ) was not expanded by the heat treatment however it was found that the thrice-induction-heating and once-quenching improved the fatigue strength. These two features indicated that the size of heat affected zone does not dominate the strength of heated-samples.

Abstract: Based on the theory of fatigue fracture of metals, quantitative analysis method was proposed for fatigue strength of cables of cable bridges and conclusions were reached through analysis of calculation formula: the analysis method of stress fatigue life was able to consider the section dimensions of the cables, plasticity of the material and stress ration caused by external loads and other factors which affect the fatigue life. This analysis theory was correct which took into consideration of relatively overall factors and was a better way to analyze the cable fatigue life. Meanwhile, the design of fatigue strength of bridge cables should adopt the theoretical fatigue limit represented by equivalent nominal stress amplitude as the design value of fatigue strength of cable. The theory represented by equivalent nominal stress amplitude considered the influence of stress ratio on fatigue life of cables caused by external loads. Compared with traditional method of fatigue strength estimate, with sufficient theory basis and overall consideration of factors, the results of this method were more reliable.

Abstract: In this paper, the analytical method of fatigue life estimation of gear teeth is proposed. The computational model of fatigue damage accumulation was built using the adequate NASGRO 2/3 formula, moreover Formans and Paris-Erdogans laws were utilized for comparison. The ranges of stress intensity factor were determined using the boundary element method.