Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 56 (2011) 188199

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Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tafmec

Crack-compliance method for assessing residual stress due to

loading/unloading history: Numerical and experimental analysis
G. Urriolagoitia-Sosa , B. Romero-ngeles, L.H. Hernndez-Gmez, C. Torres-Torres,
G. Urriolagoitia-Caldern
Instituto Politcnico Nacional, Seccin de Estudios de Posgrado e Investigacin, Escuela Superior de Ingeniera Mecnica y Elctrica, Unidad Profesional Adolfo Lpez Mateos,
Edicio 5, 2do Piso, Col. Lindavista, CP 07738, Mxico DF, Mexico

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Available online 26 November 2011
Keywords:
Crack initiation
Residual stress
Crack compliance method
Modied SEN specimen

a b s t r a c t
The understanding of how materials fail is still today a fundamental research problem for scientist and
engineers. The main concern is the assessment of the necessary conditions to propagate a crack that will
eventually lead to failure. Nevertheless, this kind of analysis tends to be more complicated, when a prior
loading history in the material is taken into consideration and it will be extremely important to recognize
all the factors involved in this process. In this work, a numerical simulation and experimental evaluation
of the induction of residual stresses, which change the crack initiation conditions, in a modied compact
tensile specimen is presented. Several analyses were carried out; an initial evaluation (numerical and
experimental) was performed in a specimen without a crack and this was used for the estimation of a
residual stress eld produced by an overload; three more cases were simulated and a crack was introduced in each specimen (1 mm, 5 mm and 10 mm long, respectively). The overload was then applied
to set up a residual stress eld into the component; furthermore, in each case the Crack Compliance
Method (CCM) was applied to measure the induced residual stress eld. By performing this numerical
simulation, the accuracy of the CCM can be evaluated and later corroborated by experimental procedure.
On the other hand, elasticplastic nite element analysis was utilized for the residual stress estimation.
The analyses were based on the mechanical properties of a biocompatible material (AISI 316L). The
obtained results provided signicant data about diverse factors, like; the manner in which a residual
stress eld could modify the crack initiation conditions, the convenient set up for the induction of a benecial residual stresses eld, as well as useful information that can be applied for the experimental implementation in this research. Finally, some benecial aspects of residual stresses are discussed.
2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
It is well known worldwide and through the mankind technology
development that the application of materials in engineering designs has posed diverse problems [1]. At the beginning of technological development, mankind set its goal to solve the problem of
shaping the materials. Latter, the necessity was both the production
and shaping of materials. Even so, for many centuries the production
and manufacture of diverse components was extremely laborious
and costly. Nevertheless, with the passing of time, the improving
of technology and skills has allowed a better application of numerous and diverse materials. In particular, the extended increase on
the use of metal technology has provided the chance of a faster
and better development. However, the use of metals in miscellaneous applications has caused the number of accidents and casualties to reach unknown levels. In these sense there has been
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: guiurri@hotmail.com (G. Urriolagoitia-Sosa).
0167-8442/$ - see front matter 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.tafmec.2011.11.007

abundant fatalities produced by; cars, trains, boats, vessels and airplane failures, construction and structure breakdowns, components
poor design, etc. In fact, the main cause of all these accidents has not
been entirely due to a poor design, but to a lack of understanding of
material deciencies in a form of pre-existing aws that tend to
nucleate cracks and propagate fractures.
This condition has been gradually corrected by a development
and implementation of a new (at that time) science that is called
Fracture Mechanics. In this sense, it has been well documented that
development of failure could be divided in two basic parts, initiation
and spread [2]. Additionally, there is a great number of external and
internal factors that contribute to the nucleation and propagation of
a crack [3]. Slip bands or dislocations and surface scratches can be
considered as internal effects, while as external factors are
considered the effect of forces and deformations. Nevertheless,
when the development, performance and effect of a crack is analyzed, prior load history in the material is not considered extensively
or in a sufcient manner. To consider prior load history in the
component raises the difculty of the problem in a substantial

G. Urriolagoitia-Sosa et al. / Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 56 (2011) 188199

way. This is why the simplest way to analyze failure and its consequences is to consider the specimen free of previous load history.
But on the other hand, the manufacture of components will always
leave inside the material an induced stress or strain eld and this
eld will interact with the development of all sorts of defects [4].
The induction of previous load history into the component is
based on the effect leaved by the application of an external agent
above the yielding strength of the material when the load is removed. The introduction of previous history can be divided in
two great groups; homogenous loading or non-homogenous loading. The consequence of a homogenous loading derives into strain
hardening and Bauschinger effect; meanwhile the consequences of
non homogeneous loading are the introduction of residual stresses.
In both cases, the consequences of the application and removal of
the external agent could contribute into the material either in a
benecial and/or a detrimental manner. Strain hardening and
Bauschinger effect can be found in the material at the same time,
if the component has been strengthen by tensile strain hardening,
Bauschinger effect (that is a change of the yield strength value of
the material) will be found in the compressive behavior and vice
versa. In relation to residual stresses, they are also detrimental
and benecial, as tensile and compressive stresses are applied together and tend to auto-equilibrate them self [5]. So, in the process
of manufacturing pieces and components it is very important to
identify the outcome that a particular fabrication process could
add to the material.
On the other hand, it is very difcult to measure the grade of
strain hardening and Bauschinger effect that a material has. It is
proposed that the best manner to do it, is to apply a four point
bending test in a produced beam specimen of the material in question and compare it to a specimen partially or fully annealed made
from the same material [6]. This procedure will provide either an
increase in the yield stress produced by the strain hardening procedure or the decrease of the mechanical resistance themselves
originated by the Bauschinger effect into the component. In contrast, the quantication of the introduction of a residual stress eld
in a component can be performed by a great number of methods or
techniques. These techniques are divided into three groups;
destructive, semi-destructive and non destructive methods. The
main difference between each group is related to the structural
damage caused to obtain the residual stress eld in the component,
which in the non-destructive methods the specimens residual
stress eld can be acquired and brought back to service, in the
semi-destructive techniques the component can be evaluated
depending on the technique used to control the damage could be
controlled, whilst the destructive procedure completely harms
the component making it un-useful for service.
In the group of destructive techniques, there is one procedure
that has called the attention of several researchers; this is the
Crack Compliance Method (CCM). The name came from the similarity of this technique to the compliance method for measuring
crack length in a fatigue or fractured specimen [7]; a known load
is applied to a cracked specimen, and the resulting strain is used
to determine the crack length (in the CCM the crack length is
known and the measured strain is used to calculate the residual
stress eld acting into the component). In the engineering environment the CCM is also known as; Fracture Mechanics Approach,
Successive Cracking Method, Slotting Method, Rectilinear Groove
Method, etc. The CCM adds unique new capabilities to the current
determination of residual stress measurement procedures. Compared to other destructive methods, this technique offers increased
spatial resolution of residual stresses and greater than before sensitivity to low stresses. Additionally, the sub-millimeter spatial resolution provided by the CCM cannot currently be matched by the
most common non-destructive techniques (X-ray or neutron
diffraction). Other CCM advantages include a simple analytical

189

technique to determine the stress intensity factor caused by a

crack in a residual stress eld and the ability to measure crack closure stresses. Furthermore, the CCM can be applied fairly easily
with commonly available equipment (strain gauges and electric
discharge or conventional machining) and it is extremely cheap,
when it is compared to other methods [7].
In this paper, it is presented the numerical simulation and
experimental evaluation of the introduction of a residual stress
eld with the objective to modify the strength of the material.
Which could improve the mechanical resistance of the component
by setting a tensile overload, which at the beginning of its action
can propitiate the nucleation or propagation of a crack, but when
the application of the external agent is ended it would leave a benecial residual stress eld. Also, in this research paper it is presented a numerical evaluation of the CCM and the determination
of the possible residual stress acting on the component. Additionally, it will be corroborated the exactitude of the application of the
CCM by an experimental procedure.
2. Theoretical basis of the crack compliance method [5]
The analytical solution using the CCM can be carried out only
when the relaxed strain readings have been obtained from cutting
a component with inherent residual stresses. In general, the analysis for the determination of the residual stress eld from the
strain data collected is performed in two stages; the forward solution stage, followed by the inverse solution stage. These solutions
are based on linear isotropic material considerations.
In this section a brief summary of the theory relative to the CCM
used in this research is presented. Let the unknown residual stress
distribution in the beam be represented by the summation of an
nth order polynomial series as:

ry x

n
X

Ai Pi x

i0

where Ai are the coefcient that have to be obtained and Pi are a

power series, x0, x1, x2, . . . xn, etc. Legendre polynomials are also used.
However, the CCM includes a step which assumes that the stress
distribution, ry(x) = Pi(x), interacting with the crack is known. This
known stress eld is used to obtain the crack compliance function
C by using Castiglianos approach. Therefore, it is required the evaluation of the change in the strain energy due to the presence of the
crack and the virtual force. One alternative is by means of the Strain
Energy Density. Its main factor, S, is direction sensitive. It establishes the direction of least resistance for crack initiation. The stationary value of Smin can be used as an intrinsic material
parameter, whose value at the point of crack instability is independent of crack geometry and loading [8]. In the case of an elastic
material, the expression of the intensity of the strain energy density
eld is:

S a11 K 2I 2a12 K I K II a22 K 2II a33 K 2III

This criterion is based on the local density of the energy eld at the
crack tip and it is not required any assumption on the direction in
which the energy is released. This is suitable for mixed mode loading. For the problem at hand, KI = ra1/2; KII = KIII = 0, because the
specimen is under mode I. In this way, S can be combined with
the theorem of Castigliano. The displacement u(a, s) can be determined by taking a derivative with respect to the virtual force, as [9]:

ua; s



Z
1 @u
1 a @K IF a; s 
0
KI
da

2 @F F0 E 0
@F
F0

Differentiating now with respect to the distance s, the strain in the

x-direction is given by [9]:

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G. Urriolagoitia-Sosa et al. / Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 56 (2011) 188199


Z
1 a
@ 2 K IF a; s 
da
eaj ; s 0
K I a

@F@s
E 0

4
F0

The strain e(a, s) (where a = crack length and s is the distance between the location of the strain gauge and the crack plane) due to
the stress elds Pi(x) is known as the compliance function Ci(aj, s)
and is given by:

1
E0

C i aj ; s

aj

K I a

@ 2 K IF a; s
da
@F@s

Due to the linearity of KIF with F, the second term under the integral
sign in Eq. (5) is the same as Z(a) in:

Za

 

B @K IF 
F @s s0

With B = 1, therefore it can be written:

1
E0

C i aj ; s

aj

K I aZa da

KI(a) is the stress intensity factor due to the residual stress eld
when the crack depth in the beam is equal to a and KIF(a) is the
stress intensity factor corresponding to the same depth due to a pair
of virtual forces F applied tangentially at a position on the beam
where strain measurements will be taken during the CCM cutting
of the slot (where Z(a) is a geometry dependant function (Eq. (3)):

Za

@ 2 K IF a; s
@F@s

3. Material and test specimen

The material used in this work is stainless steel AISI 316L, which
is one of the most utilized steel in the area of biomechanics. Medical grade stainless steel AISI 316L is presently used extensively in
medicine for implants. This grade of stainless steel has been used
to avoid and/or minimize the danger of pitting corrosion by making the high potentials at which pitting occurs highly improbable,
although this generally depends on the individual human being
involved.
To characterize the stainless steel AISI 316L material, four beam
specimens; 10 mm high by 6.35 mm thick by 250 mm length were
prepared [14]. The beams were stress relieved by annealing to
eliminate prior loading history [15]. The stressstrain curve for this
material was obtained by four point bending tests (Fig. 1) [16].
The main advantages on this procedure are the simultaneous
evaluation of tensile and compress behavior; also it is possible to
determine if the material has prior loading history. The Youngs
modulus and Poisson ratio obtained from this tests and used for
the application of the CCM was 190 MPa and 0.28 respectively.
Badr, has designed a special keyhole specimen to measure the
maintainability of residual stresses induced by an overload [17].
The specimen is basically a modied compact-tension specimen
per ASTM standard E 647-91 with special requirements as

By following the weight function approach, KI(a) and KIF(a) can be

expressed as [10]:

K I a

hx; ary x dx

Za 4:283

hx; a1  2x dx

10

where ry(x) = Pi(x) and h(x, a) is known as the weight function [11].
So, the ryF(x) is the stress eld due to the virtual force F. Once the
Ci(a, s) solutions are determined the expected strain due to the
stress components in Eq. (1) can be obtained as:

eaj ; s

n
X

Ai C i aj ; s

11

i0

The unknown terms Ai are determined so that the strains given

by Eq. (11) match those strains measured in the experiment during
cutting, this is e(aj, s)actual. In order to minimize the average error
over all data points for an nth order approximation, the method
of least squares is used to obtain the values of Ai. Therefore the
number of cutting increments m is chosen to be greater than the
order of the polynomial, i.e. m > n. This work used n = 7 with 8 constants Ai and m = 9, this being the number of experimental slot cutting depths at which strain readings were collected. The least
square solution is obtained by minimizing the square of the error
relative to the unknown constant Ai [12]:
m
@ X
@ai jl

"

ea; sacyual 

n
X

#2
Ak C k aj ; s

0 i 0; . . . . . . n

12

K0

This gives [H]{A} = {J} where [H] = [C]T[C] and {J} = [C]T{ej}actual
[13] gives a linear set of simultaneous solutions from which Ai values are determined and Eq. (1) is then used to determine the residual stress distribution. The numerical procedure was implemented
in a FORTRAN program.

Fig. 1. Mechanical characterization of stainless steel AISI 316L.

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Table 1
Stressstrain data used for the numerical simulation [19].
Stress (MPa)

Strain

370
425
471
491.7
513.5
525
546
558
567
575.8
584.5
590.5
596.85

0.001947
0.005104
0.008171
0.009828
0.011726
0.012756
0.015000
0.016500
0.018000
0.019500
0.021000
0.022500
0.024000

Fig. 2. Modied compact tensile specimen SEN.

Fig. 3. Mechanical properties stainless steel AISI 316L [18,19].

indicated in ASTM E 399. The main feature of this new experimental sample is a circular hole introduced at the notch tip (Fig. 2). It
can be clearly observed from Fig. 2, that the addition of the hole
will produce a stress concentration into some section of the specimen when the tensile load is applied. This stress concentration
will not only produce a non homogeneous loading (inducing a
residual stress eld when the load is removed), but it will also produce a high stress concentration action that could promote very
easily crack nucleation and propagation.

Fig. 4. Modied compact tensile specimen SEN modeled.

Apparently, the main reason for the modication of the compact

SEN specimen is to ensure (up to certain degree) that the manufacturing process will not produce additional cracks or structural defects into the material, while is possible in the standard compact

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Fig. 5. Numerical evaluation of residual stress.

tensile specimen. The main characteristic on the modication of

the specimen is a hole inducted at the notch tip, which when a sufciently large tensile overload is applied to the specimen, makes
the material at the concentration zone to behave plastically and
deform while the surrounding material remains elastic. Upon the
removal of the overload, the elastic energy surrounding the material compresses it at the stress concentration section inducing a
compressive residual stress eld. As was shown in the numerical
analysis presented in this research, the induced residual stress eld
by an overload can be simulated using the nite element method.
For this work only one half of the specimen was modeled and analyzed due to the symmetry of the geometry, this saves computational resources [18].
4. Statement of the problem and numerical simulation
The part of the work presented in this paper is aimed to establish the effect of prior history loading in the development of a crack
and how a benecial residual stress eld could increase the
mechanical resistance of the material. In this paper, four study
cases based in numerical simulations are presented. The rst case
of study was a tensile specimen set to endure a load above its
yielding stress considering the introduction of a compressive residual stress eld at the stress concentration zone (Fig. 2, Point A). The
next three cases of study, consider the presence of a crack before
the application of a tensile overload. The length of the crack was
set to be 1 mm, 5 mm and 10 mm respectively for each case. The
main objective of introducing the crack was to establish the effect
that such a defect would have in the development of the residual

stress eld after removing the applied load. The mechanical properties employed for the numerical analysis were the ones obtained
by four point bending tests performed on beams manufactured
from a stainless steel AISI 316L (Fig. 3a) [16].
The elastic properties of the material were set up as follows;
Youngs modulus of 190 000 N/mm2 (E) and Poisson ratio of 0.28
(t). For the elasto-plastic condition a kinematic hardening rule
was applied and the mechanical properties were introduced in a
tabular manner (Fig. 3b and Table 1). The yield stress was set up
at 370 MPa and the yield strain was considered at 1947 le. The
maximum stress and the corresponding strain was set to be
596.85 MPa and 24,000 le [19].
A general model consisting of a non-linear kinematic
hardening and isotropic hardening components was used for the
analysis [5]:

da C

r0

pl

r ad


e  cadpl e
pl b

r0 rj0 Q 1 1  ee

13
14

where e is the equivalent plastic strain, a is the back-stress, C is the

initial kinematic hardening modulus, c determines the rate at which
kinematic modulus decreases with plastic deformation, r0 is the
current yield stress, r|o is the initial yield stress, Q1 is the maximum change in the size of the yield surface and b denes the rate
at which the size of the yield surface changes as plastic straining
develops. Eq. (13) describes the translation of the yield surface in
the stress space due to the back-stress a, while Eq. (14) describes

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193

introduction of a crack (Fig. 4a) and this lack on the application of

symmetry will depend on the length of the crack to be simulated.
The numerical analysis for each case of study was performed by
a two step procedure. The rst step was done by applying the load
up an established value of 100 N per active node and sends it to be
solved. In the second step of the analysis, the load was removed
and once again the simulation was sent to be solved. It is important
to mention that the numerical analysis has to be performed uninterrupted, otherwise the result data from the loading stage to the
unloading stage will not be added (Fig. 4b). The same consideration
has to be taken later, when it is performed the elimination of
elements to produce the evaluation of the CCM.
5. Results for the cases of residual stress eld induction
The rst case of study deals with the introduction of a residual
stress eld into a specimen free of a crack (Fig. 5a). For the next
three cases of study, a numerical analysis was performed on the effect of the introduction of a crack with different lengths (1 mm,
5 mm and 10 mm, respectively) for each case of study. The residual
stress elds obtained by numerical simulation can be observed in
Fig. 5.
From Fig. 5ad, it can be seen that after a loading process has
nished and the external agent has been removed, a residual stress
eld has been inducted into the component. In all four cases it can
be seen a compressive stress value at the left part of the graphics,
which corresponds to the stress concentration point at the crack
tip depending on the case of study. It can also be observed, that
the maximum value of the compressive stress is in this region
and will decrease with the length until becomes a tensile stress.
This is an obvious observation, because residual stresses are
auto-equilibrant, which means that compressive and tensile stresses have to interact together to exist.
6. CCM numerical evaluation

Fig. 6. Specimen preparation for the evaluation of the CCM by the FEM.

the change of the equivalent stress dening the size of the yield surface r0, as a function of plastic deformation.
To save computational resources all the numerical simulations
performed in this work were carried out in a symmetrical manner
and all the specimens were modeled in 2D (Fig. 4). Quadratic order
elements (Plane 183) with 8 nodes were used and plane stress analysis was performed. The numerical model was developed by nodes,
lines and areas. The specimen was loaded (in all four cases) in tensile
form and the force was uniformly distributed among 17 nodes on the
loading keyhole with a magnitude of 100 N each (Fig. 4a). The base of
the specimen (from Point A to the strain relaxation measurement
point (Fig. 2)) was specially prepared with a rectangular zone
(elements dimensions 0.5 mm width by 1 mm large), this zone will
be employed later in the analysis to simulate the introduction of a
slot and to evaluate the performance of the CCM, and strain relaxation data will be obtained at the rear node of the base line (Fig. 3).
Boundary conditions were applied at the bottom line in a symmetrical manner [18]. When the cases of study required considering the
introduction of a crack, the lack of application of boundary conditions at the near end of the bottom line is used to simulate the

After the numerical simulation for the induction of the residual

stress eld was nished, a numerical reproduction of the behavior
of the CCM was carried out. The main objective to perform this
evaluation was to assess the exactitude of the CCM against numerical data obtained in the analysis. From this evaluation it is possible, later on, to establish a better experimental practice so as to
nd the percentage error on the application of the CCM.
The theory and the experimental tests to apply the CCM have
been widely explained by several authors [2023]. Additionally,
there has been development in a new way to apply the CCM in
an experimental form and also in a numerical manner [24]. For
the development of the numerical procedure a simulation of the
cut is created by the deletion of nite elements in the area or zone
that will be represented as the cut or slot. The creation of the simulated slot produces the rearrangement of the residual stress eld
inside the component over the material that has not been affected
by the cut. The reshufe of the residual stress eld will produce a
strain or deformation relaxation, which can be measured by a
strain gauge ahead in the slot growth. The strain data used for
the CCM in the numerical analysis is obtained at a node located
ahead of the direction of the cutting procedure (Fig. 2) [25]. The
strain data used in the CCM is only the elastic strain value, not
the complete (elastic and plastic) strain measured. The elastic
strain measured is then introduced into the CCM developed program and the original stress eld acting inside the component is
obtained.
For all cases presented in this paper, the numerical evaluation of
the CCM was performed by simulating the introduction of a slot,
which would cause a modication, by auto-equilibrium, of the

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Fig. 7. Residual stress comparison between FEM and CCM.

Fig. 8. Cracked modied compact tensile specimens SEN.

residual stress acting on the base line, producing a relaxation in the

material. The relaxation will produce strain data (elastic and plastic), which can be used by the CCM to determine the acting residual
stress eld. In Fig. 6 are presents in detail the general specimen
model with the prepared area for the simulation of the introduction of the slot and the zone where the inducted crack was posed
(for the second, third and fourth cases of study).
In Fig. 6a it is presented the general design of the specimen by
lines. Therefore, in Fig. 6b it can be observed the rectangular zone,
where, by deleting elements of 0.5 mm high and 1 mm long the

creation of a cut or slot can be simulated. On the other hand, in

Fig. 6c it is shown the meshed specimen the lack of boundary conditions at the bottom of the component to simulate the effect of the
crack and the relaxation consequence caused by the introduction of
the slot by deleting the elements. Meanwhile in Fig. 6d, presents a
zoom of the same condition for the last gure. It is important to
state, that the numerical simulation has to be carried out by a
sequence of several different steps, from the consideration of the
application of the load and unload process (acting stresses and
introduction of residual stresses), the total or partial application

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195

Fig. 9. Slot width evaluation for compact tensile specimens SEN.

Fig. 10. Representation of the way the specimen is support and cut.

of the boundary conditions (specimen without or with crack) and

the deletion of the elements one by one to obtain the strain data
to evaluate the CCM.
After the simulation of the slot was performed, the elastic strain
data that will be used for the evaluation of the CCM was collected
and Fig. 6 shows the obtained results. This information, which is
used by the CCM program, has to be fed into the commercial program as a polynomial equation of the 7th order. In fact, this equation depicts the curve that best ts the results obtained by the
numerical simulation; this paper presents only the graphic results.
The residual stress results obtained by the CCM for each one of
these cases are presented in Fig. 7. These gures show as well comparisons against results obtained from numerical simulation by
FEM. From Fig. 7, it is possible to see that the rst value found
by the use of the CCM is not at the surface of the specimen, but
at 0.1 mm from the total width of the specimen, this is because
the program is set to produce only nine points along the evaluated
width of the beam and the reason to chose only nine data points
was based in the precision of the programming. If a procedure is
set to divide the results in more points, the precision will be less
accurate because it will tend to produce more decimal errors and
by dividing the results in fewer points, the obtained data would
be insufcient to produce an accurate result.

7. Experimental introduction of the residual stress eld

For the development of the experimental analysis a set of sixteen specimens were manufactured and there were divided into
four groups of 4 specimens each. The entire set of specimens was
stress released by a heat treatment process at 600 C for half an
hour and slowly cooled down inside a furnace [15]. It is important
to highlight, that a procedure to avoid possible oxidation during
the heat treatment process was performed, which includes the
introduction of the specimens into a semi-vacuum metallic bag
made from thin sheets of medium Carbon steel. Additionally, the
main reason for applying a heat treatment process was to eliminate any kind of prior loading history acting into the material,
which can cause the indetermination of the actual original residual
stress eld induced into the material by the application of the over
loading process.
Four cases of study were proposed for the development of the
experimental analysis. For the rst case of study, it was included
the introduction of a residual stress eld into a specimen free of
a crack. For the next three cases, an analysis was performed to
evaluate the effect of an existing crack (with different lengths
1 mm, 5 mm and 10 mm, respectively) into the specimen and the
state of a residual stress eld, which would modify the conditions

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Fig. 11. Residual stress comparison between experimental evaluations against

numerical analysis.

for crack propagation. In this sense, the generation of the crack into
the specimen was performed by a wire electro discharge machine
(EDM) in a manner of a slot (Fig. 8).
The decision to use the electric discharge machine was to produce a slot that will function as a crack, but according the introduction of an additional stress eld into the material by cold work
procedures. Additionally, great care was taken to induce a crack
that was no thicker than 1 mm for all cases. In Fig. 10 are presented
all the specimens showing the introduction of the crack and the
measured data obtained for each one of the pieces. In these gures
it was relevant to ensure that the slot was as thin as possible, for all
cases the thickness of the slot was between 0.315 mm to 0.36 mm,
some examples are shown in Fig. 9 [18].
All the specimens were prepared with a strain gauge at the rear
surface (with respect to the stress concentration hole (Fig. 2)). This
gauge will be used mainly to measure the strain relaxation caused
by the introduction of the slot and is applied by CCM for the evaluation of the residual stress eld induced into the material. Also,
the strain gauge can be used to determine the magnitude of the
overload applied to introduce the residual stress eld, keeping
identical magnitudes of the overload for all study cases. Additionally, for the specimens free of an initial crack, a strain gauge was
applied at the holes border (Fig. 2) to measure the strain effect
due to the application of the tensile load and to correlate the
experimental analysis with the numerical evaluation.
In a previous numerical simulation research a 100 N load was
distributed on 17 nodes at the loading keyhole (numerical part of
this study). The resulting numerical strain obtained at the tip of
the concentration hole was of 5675 le and was taken as the base

Fig. 12. Residual stress comparison between experimental evaluations against

numerical analysis.

for the determination of the experimental load, which was found

to be 975 N. The load was applied in a tensile way by a servohydraulic device, with a capacity of 100 kN and was the same for
all the experimental study cases. This overload magnitude is large
enough to produce a localized plasticity effect near the stress concentration zone while elasticity will remain around the rest of the
specimen, so by unloading the system a residual stress eld is
induced.
8. Specimen preparation for the application of the crack
compliance method
After the induction of the residual stress eld was performed,
the results obtained by the numerical analysis were used to assess
the manner in which the specimen is stress released by the introduction of the cut. With this information, it was possible to determine the best way to hold the specimen to perform the cutting of
the slot and obtain the strain relaxation for the application of the
CCM. So, it was decided to clamp the specimen at one and support
it at the other side as shown in Fig. 10.
The cut was done by a wire EDM (CHARMILLES, model ROBOFIL)
in sequential steps 1 mm depth for all cases, and the strain relaxation data was obtained using a Wheatstone bridge conguration.
Also, the strain gauges were protected with M-Coat-A Air Drying
Polyurethane coating as rst stage and nishing with an M-CoatB Nitride Rubber coating. This procedure is to ensure the encapsulation of the strain gauge when it is submerged into the dielectric
liquid used by the EDM machine.

G. Urriolagoitia-Sosa et al. / Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 56 (2011) 188199

Fig. 13. Residual stress comparison between experimental evaluations against

numerical analysis.

9. Experimental cases of study and results

The theory, application and performance of the CCM have been
extensively explained by several authors [4,7,9]. The rst experimental case of study in this work is the introduction of a residual
stress eld into a specimen free of crack, Fig. 11a. Also this rst
experimental case was used to set up and evaluate the accuracy
of the CCM. For this rst case, three specimens were prepared,
overloaded and induced with a residual stress eld. In Fig. 11b
are presented the strain relaxation behavior against the length of
the cut, which is used to determine, by the CCM, the original state
of the residual stress eld.
For the next three experimental study cases, an analysis was
performed on the effect of the introduction of a residual stress eld
in a specimen with a crack of different lengths (1 mm, 5 mm and
10 mm, respectively). For all three cases, three specimens were
prepared respectively. The results obtained by the application of
the CCM and also a comparison against the numerical evaluation
for the case of a specimen with a crack length of 1 mm can be
observed in Fig. 12a. The obtained strain relaxation used for the
CCM to determine the introduced original residual stress eld
can also be observed in Fig. 12b.
In Figs. 13 and 14 it can be observed the residual stress results
obtained from CCM evaluation for specimens with a 5 mm and
10 mm crack lengths. It is important to mention that three specimens were prepared with strain gauges for each particular case
of study. In Figs. 13 and 14 it is also shown the strain relaxation
caused by the induction of the slot into the material, which is
produced by the re-accommodation of the residual stress eld into

197

Fig. 14. Residual stress comparison between experimental evaluations against

numerical analysis.

the uncut material. The results obtained by the application of the

CCM and also a comparison against the numerical evaluation for
each specic case of study with a 5 mm and 10 mm crack length
are shown in these two gures.

10. Conclusions
This research was performed to validate the use of FEM in the
introduction of residual stresses and to validate its application to
the CCM. The numerical data obtained facilitates the experimental
procedure for the induction of residual stress elds and the application to the CCM. The modication of the compact tensile specimen SEN, will provide a more controllable set up for the
introduction of residual stresses, this is because, if the specimen
is kept with a notch tip, it cannot ensure the nucleation of the
crack. The main idea of this research was to evaluate the effect of
a crack with the introduction of residual stress elds, which has
to be done by reasonably controlling that no defects are present.
From Fig. 5 it can be concluded, that after the effect of the load is
removed from the specimens with a crack, a benecial residual
stress eld has been induced at the zone or surface of the stress
concentration. So, to be able to propagate the crack will require
sufcient energy to overcome the compressive residual stress eld
introduced into the component by the loading process. Apparently,
the combination of loading the crack and removing the load effect,
allows the material to raise its mechanical resistance. Nevertheless, much care has to be taken into consideration, as a crack there
is in the specimen and this could accumulate plastic energy due to
subsequent loading cycles prior to propagation.

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G. Urriolagoitia-Sosa et al. / Theoretical and Applied Fracture Mechanics 56 (2011) 188199

Additionally, the exactitude on the application of the CCM has

been evaluated by the use of FEM. Signicant data has been obtained for the experimental procedure of the CCM and a proper
manner to establish its application. On the other hand it can be observed in Fig. 7, that similar residual stress elds between FEM and
CCM have been achieved. Nonetheless, it can be observed in Fig. 7,
that both ends of the curve for the calculated residual stress eld
are not as accurate as those in the middle part of the specimen.
It is thought that the mismatch observed at the opposite end of
the rear location is due to the remote position in which the relaxation effect is evaluated, as the strain relaxation location cannot be
fully determined. With respect to the discrepancy in residual stress
results at the end near to the strain relaxation location it has been
concluded that this originates by the fact that the structural integrity of the material has been compromised by the introduction of
the cut, and there is only a small part of material left.
The validation for the experimental application of the CCM on
the determination of induced residual stress elds has been presented in this paper. This research has proved that the CCM can
be applied to components other than beams, pipes and regular
plates. It has also been established that the CCM can be applied to
specimens wider than 10 mm, this investigation was applied to
material thickness of 23 mm, 28 mm, 32 mm and 33 mm (which
represents specimens with crack lengths of 10 mm, 5 mm, and
1 mm, and a specimen without a crack).
The development of a previous numerical analysis, which simulated the problem applied to this experimental procedure, provided important and signicant data. The numerical study
produced results that were directly applied on the experimental
testing and have been useful to simplify the CCM procedure. Also,
it was very helpful to dene the correct manner to hold and support the piece at the moment of the introduction of the slot. Furthermore, the numerical investigation is a powerful tool that
leads to the expected results, which later were corroborated by
the experimental procedure and have proved that the introduction
of a residual stress eld could enhance the mechanical resistance
of the material.
It has been corroborated the importance in the use of the modied compact tensile specimen SEN, which has provided a more
controllable set up for the introduction of residual stresses and
the development of a methodology that effectively arrests crack
propagation. Nevertheless, the main objective of this research
was to evaluate the effect of a crack with the introduction of the
residual stress eld. From Figs. 1114 it can be concluded that after
the effect of the load is removed from specimens with a crack, a
benecial residual stress eld has been induced. On the other hand
it can be concluded from Figs. 1114, that there are similar residuals stress elds between both the numerical simulation and the
experimental procedure. Nonetheless, it can be observed in Figs.
1114 that at the ends of the specimen the calculation of the residual stress elds are not as accurate as in the middle part of the
specimen. The mismatch at the end opposite to the rear location
could be caused by the effect of the remote position of the effect
and the relaxation cannot be totally read at the strain relaxation
location. With respect to the discrepancy in residual stress results
at the end near to the point of collection of relaxation data, a possible explanation could be based on the fact that the structural
integrity has been compromised by the introduction of the cut
and only 1 mm of material has been left. It has been corroborated
that the combination of loading the crack and removing the load
effect has allowed the material to gain mechanical resistance.
Additionally, it could be said, that a mechanical procedure (like

the introduction of a residual stress eld) can extend the working

life of a component after a crack has been successively loaded and
unloaded.
Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge the nancial support from
the Mexican government by the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologa and the Instituto Politcnico Nacional.
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