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INTRODUCTION It was first realized in the middle of the nineteenth century that engineering components and structures often fail when subjected to repeated fluctuating loads whose magnitude is well below the critical load under monotonic loading. Early investigations were primarily concerned with axle and bridge failures which occurred at cyclic load levels less than half their corresponding monotonic load magnitudes. Failure due to repeated loading was called "fatigue failure".

A better understanding of the fatigue phenomenon can be obtained by modeling the fatigue crack initiation and propagation processes. Crack initiation is analyzed at the microscopic level, while the continuum mechanics approach is used for crack propagation. The necessity for addressing these two processes separately arises from the inability of the current theory to bridge the gap between material damage that occurs at microscopic and macroscopic levels. It is generally accepted that, when a structure is subjected to repeated external load, energy is accumulated in the neighborhood of voids and microscopic defects which grow and coalesce, forming microscopic cracks. Eventually larger macroscopic cracks are formed. A macrocrack may be defined as one that is large enough to permit the application of the principles of homogeneous continuum mechanics.A macrocrack is usually referred to as a fatigue crack. The number of cycles required to initiate a fatigue crack is the fatigue crack initiation life Ni.

Following the initiation of a fatigue crack, slow stable crack propagation begins,until the crack reaches a critical size corresponding with the onset of global instability leading to catastrophic failure. Thus, the fatigue life of an engineering component may be considered to be composed of three stages: the initiation or stage I; the propagation or stage II; and the fracture or stage III, in which the crack growth rate increases rapidly as global instability is approached. The number of cycles required to propagate a fatigue crack until it reaches its critical size is the fatigue

crackpropagation life Np.Depending on the material, the amplitude of the fluctuating load and environmental conditions, the fatigue crack initiation life may be a small or a substantial part of the total fatigue life.

1.1 Terminology The process of fatigue failure may be defined as a process in which there is progressive, localized, permanent micro structural change occurring in a structure where it is subjected to fluctuating strain at some material point or points. There are two kinds of fatigue loads, (i) constant amplitude load and, (ii) variable amplitude load. The load on locomotive axles are of constant amplitude whereas fluctuating wind load on wing of an airplane is of variable amplitude. In certain cases, both types of load may be superposed on a component. Figure 1 shows the constant amplitude loading with maximum stress minimum stress = We define mean stress = Corresponding to = = and , we can determine f( ) f( ) and as with the stress range given by: as: and

Where f( ) is the geometric factor for crack length a and component width W In most cases, dependence of f( ) on crack length a is secondary comparison to dependence. In order to keep the calculations simple, some designers prefer not to consider variation of f( ). The difference and is an important

parameter for determining crack growth and is expressed as:

Fig. 1. Constant amplitude loading

K =

Another parameter, stress ratio R, is also used and defined as: R= R= =1 = = = K = =


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f( ) f( )

f( )

Figure. 2. Categories of stress ratio

A fatigue crack may be initiated at an existing notch, an inclusion or a surface. It has been observed that initiation requires a large number of load cycles. Once a crack initiated, it grows by some disturbance in every cycle, initially with extremely small growth per cycle. As the crack becomes longer, the rate of propagation per cycle, , also increases. Obviously, cracks of very small lengths cannot be

detected by available non-destructive test techniques. The number of cycles required to initiate a crack and then make it grow to detectable length is known as initiation life Ni. detectable crack in most cases is still sub-critical and needs to grow further under the fatigue load. The number of cycles required to grow the smallest detectable crack to critical size is known as propagation life Np. Thus, the total life N becomes N = Ni + Np

Figure. 3. Typical form of crack size versus number of cycles curve for constant amplitude loading 1.2. Fatigue Crack Growth Equation A number of different quantitative continuum mechanics models of fatigue crack propagation have been proposed in the literature. All these models lead to relationsbased mainly on experimental data correlations. They relate da/dN to such

variables as the external load, the crack length, the geometry and the material properties.

Figure. 4. Typical form of the fatigue crack growth rate curve

Experimentally it is found that for a given load ratio of log10 (

Vslog10( KI) obtained from various different specimens types superpose in one another to give a single curve for a given material. This serves as a metal property. Region-I 10-8 m/cycle Threshold value K Kth below which no crack propagation occurs .In this

region the crack growth is sensitive to (i) (ii) (iii) Micro-structure R ratio Environment

Figure. 5. log10 ( Region-II

) Vs log10( KI) curve

10-8

10-5 m/cycle vs log( KI)

For given R value , a linear relation exists between log Log10 ( ) = m log10 ( KI) + log10 C

= log10 ( K1)m+ log10 C = log C ( KI)m

= C ( KI)m ------------------- PARIS LAW

Where C & m are material constants. This region is continuum region. 2 m 12 (approximately)

Region-III 10-5 m/cycle.


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KI-----KIC Crack growth is sensitive to: (i) (ii) (iii) (iv) Micro structure Stress state R-ratio Thickness of specimen. = C ( KI)m

Therefore Limitations:

C=

Paris law is independent of R value. The dependence of C on R can be written as = (K)mr

Where Cw is the value of C at R=0 Modifying the above equation as = Cw ( Since )nw ( )mr-nw

= Kmax& writing mr nw = mw = Cw(K)mw Knw max ------------walker equation.

Foreman Law: Fracture occurs when kmaxreaches kc since kmax= = (1-R)Kc At fracture the growth curve is infinity. = CF At fracture (1-R)Kc = & -----foreman law.

1.3 Effect Of An Overload An overload is a pulse (or a set of pulses) of higher amplitude on a constant amplitude fatigue load as shown in Fig 6.the crack propagation retards considerably after the overload pulse.

Figure. 6. An overload pulse on the constant amplitude fatigue load

Why does the propagation rate decrease after the overload pulse? To understand it, wc look into the behavior of the plastic zone near the crack tip. The overload forms a much larger plastic zone. During the unloading portion of the overload pulse, the surrounding elastic material tries to regain its original state. However, the plastic zone cannot regain the original state and, therefore, compressive residual stresses are developed in the vicinity of the crack tip. In the follow-up pulses of the constant amplitude load, the tensile loading at the crack tip is suppressed by the residual compressive stresses. Consequently, da/dN is lowered appreciably. The crack tip may remain within the enclave of residual compressive stress for many subsequent pulses of the constant amplitude load as shown Figure 7.

Figure. 7. Enclave of residual compressive stress developed by the overload and plastic zone of subsequent pulses

It, therefore, takes some load cycles for the crack tip to come out of the enclave and then only da/dN regains its value based on the length of the crack and at that location. The effect of overload on crack growth is shown in Figure 8.

Figure. 8. Retarded growth of the crack owing to the overload pulse


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1.4 Variable Amplitude Loading The fatigue crack propagation results discussed so far have been concerned withconstant amplitude load fluctuation. Although this type of loading occurs frequently in practice, the majority of engineering structures are subjected to complex fluctuating loading. Unlike the case of constant cyclic load where gradually with increasing crack length, abrupt changes take place in increases due to

changes in applied load. Thus, there occur load interaction effects which greatly influence the fatigue crack propagation behavior. Due to the crack retardation phenomenon, the determination of the fatigue lifeunder a variable amplitude loading by simply summing the fatigue lives of the various constant amplitude loads in the loading history leads to conservative predictions. Of the various methods proposed for this reason, we will briefly present the root-mean square model and the models based on crack retardation and crack closure. Based on the application, a suitable statistical procedure is adopted to determine the root-mean square value of . If Paris law is chosen, the propagation equation becomes: =C( Where
rms m rms)

is the root-mean square value of

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ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLES : Example 1:A515 steel y= 100ksi = 0.66 * 10-8 ( Kic = 150ksi Edge crack in tension f( ) = 1.12 max= 45ksi min= 25ksi fatigue life ? =max min = 20ksi acr :kic = max 150 = 45 Acr = 2.8 in Assume a0 = 0.3 in a1 = 0.4 in aavg = 0.35 in a = 0.1 in kI = 1.12 Paris law: = = ai= 0.3 af = 0.4 = 0.1 = = 12,500 cycle Total N = 0+12500 = 12500cycle

avg 2.25 i) 2.25 i)

(1.12)f( (1.12)

= 0.66 * 10-8 (

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STEP 2: ai= 0.4 af = 0.5 = 9750 N = 12500 + 9750 = 22,250 STEP N: ai= 2.7 af= 2.8 = air = 1234 N = 87028. Example 2:An aircraft flight problem 10 gusts(spikes) per flight (between takeoff and landing).It has teo flights per day. Each gust has a max =200MPa ,min = 50MPa.Aircraft is made by aluminium, which has a resistance if

R = 15kg/m2 ; E= 70GPa; C = 5 * 10-11 m/cycles M=3 a0 = 4mm. How long would it be before the crack is moved to its critical length. Assume, K= Kc= max K= ( )
( )( )

(assume ( )=1) = 0.0084 m = 8.4 mm

ac=(Kc2/ max2) =

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da/dN = C(KI)m N= =
[ ]

= = -2128

= 10428 cycles The time t t= = 17 months = 1.5 years Example 3:An aircraft flight problem 10 gusts(spikes) per flight (between takeoff and landing).It has teo flights per day. Each gust has a max =200MPa ,min = 50MPa.Aircraft is made by aluminium, which has a resistance if

R = 15kg/m2 ; E= 70GPa; C = 5 * 10-11 m/cycles M=3 a0 = 4mm. How long would it be before the crack is moved to its critical length.

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except that a more sophisticated and expensive NDT equipment is available with a resolution of 0.1 m. a0 = 0.1 mm N= ]

= 184583 cycles t = 316 months = 26 years

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REFERENCES

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