Solid Mechanics EMM331

Dr. Feizal Yusof

Fatigue Lecture 1
Week 13-14 (6 hrs)

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WW 13 - Fatigue
INTRODUCTION

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Fatigue discourse in EMM331

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 Important points from video
• What is fatigue? • Low cycle fatigue
• Example of failures • High cycle fatigue
associated with fatigue • Goodman diagram
• Testing materials for • Miner’s law
fatigue • Paris-Erdogan law
• Fatigue data
• Fatigue endurance
• Statistical data
dispersion

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 Force

Introduction
Force
1. In the early part of the century*, 18th
Force
the failure of some mechanical
components subjected to nominal
stresses well below the tensile
strength of the material aroused
some interest among a few engineers Force
of that time.
2. Examples of components failure such
as a bolt or a shaft made from a
ductile material such as mild steel
could fracture suddenly in what Flat surface Thinning, conic surface
-Load below design stress -Load near or over design stress
appeared to be a brittle manner. - Takes many cycles to fail - Several cycles to fail
3. There was no obvious defect in
workmanship or material and the
only feature common to these
failures was the fact that the stresses
imposed were not steady in
magnitude but varied in a cyclical
manner.
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*Timeline of fatigue research history : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatigue_(material)#Crack_growth_methods
 Introduction
4. This phenomenon of failure of a 7. How to reduce fatigue failure
material when subjected to a number occurrences?
of varying stress cycles became i. Reduction of stress raiser in geometries
known as fatigue since it was ii. Reduction of awkward loading conditions
thought that fracture occurred owing iii. Correct design stress
to the metal weakening or becoming iv. Presence of voids and microcracks
“tired”. v. etc (you have to be aware of what your
are doing and to ensure everything is
5. It has been estimated that at least safe!!) – do a Failure Mode and Effect
90% of all machine and structural Analysis (FMEA)of your design and
installations.
failures have been caused by some
form of fatigue.
6. Due to that, every engineer should
be aware of this phenomenon and
have some idea of its mechanics and
what can be done to minimize or
avoid the risk of this type of failure.

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 Test methods
1. Fatigue failures occur most often in
moving machinery parts/components
e.g. shafts, axles, connecting rods,
valves, springs which are small but
can also for large geometries /
components e.g. wings and fuselage
of an aircraft or the hull of a
submarine because in service they
are subjected to variations of stress.
2. It is common to conduct full scale
testing on such structures.

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 Test methods
1. Lab tests are also carried out on
particular materials to establish their
fatigue characteristics and to study
factors such as their susceptibility to
stress concentration.
2. A typical lab testing configuration is:
3. A cylindrical bar is arranged as a
cantilever in pure bending.
4. It is then rotated while subjected to a
bending moment and hence each
fibre of the bar suffers cycles of
reversed bending stress.
5. Axial load fatigue test is another
option.
i) Magnetic
ii) Screw
iii) Hydraulic
Instron 8874
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 Characterizing fatigue problems
1. Issues related to Fatigue has been 4. Fig 1 shows a typical situation where
seen in many significant events over fatigue failure can arise owing to the
the course of 300 years. Therefore geometrical configurations
there are techniques proposed to
deal with related fatigue problems.
2. The advent of approaches in design
and assessment of structures due to
fatigue can be highlighted to the
types of fatigue failure involved.
3. Fatigue are mostly due to the
fluctuating load experienced by a
structure and this can be easily
explained by:

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 Characterizing fatigue problems
5. In real condition, the cyclic loading
experienced by a component can be
represented by a cyclic stress
spectrum as shown in Fig 2.
6. However it has been general practice
to employ a sinusoidal curve to
represent the cycle due to the
applied load.
7. Fig 3 shows a general type of stress
cycle, which is termed fluctuating, in
which an alternating stress is
imposed on a mean stress.
8. This cycle can consist of any
combination of upper and lower
limits within the static strength which
are both positive or both negative
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 Fatigue stress cycles
9. The relationship between the various
stress values is of some importance
and can be mathematically
described:

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 Fatigue stress cycles
10. The mean stress 𝑆𝑚 is half the 14. From Eqs. (1) and (2) we can state the
algebraic sum of the maximum stress, maximum stress as
𝑆𝑚𝑎𝑥 or 𝑆! and the minimum stress 𝑆#$% = 𝑆# + 𝑆$ ---(5a)
𝑆𝑚𝑖𝑛 or 𝑆" .
and
!
𝑆# = (𝑆#$% +𝑆#&' ) --- (1) 𝑆#&' = 𝑆# − 𝑆$ ---(5b)
"
11. The stress amplitude, Sa, is the 15. Some additional relationships can
algebraic difference between half of now be derived:
Smax and Smin. () )!"#
𝑆$ = = 1 − 𝑅 ---(6a)
! " "
𝑆$ = (𝑆#$% − 𝑆#&' ) --- (2) )!"#
" 𝑆#$% = 1 + 𝑅 ---(6b)
12. The ratio of the minimum to the "
!*+
maximum stress is termed the stress 𝑅= ---(6c)
!,+
ratio, R: !*-
𝑅 = 𝑆#&' /𝑆#$% --- (3) 𝐴= ---(6d)
!,-
13. While the amplitude ratio is 𝐴:
𝐴 = 𝑆$ /𝑆# --- (4)

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 Fatigue stress cycles
16. Cyclic stressing with zero mean can
be specified by giving the amplitude
𝑆$ , or by giving the numerically equal
maximum stress, 𝑆#$% . If the mean
stress is not zero, two independent
values are needed to specify the
loading.
17. Some combinations that may be used
are 𝑆$ and 𝑆# , 𝑆.$% and 𝑅, ΔS and
𝑅, 𝑆#$% and 𝑆#&' , and 𝑆$ and 𝐴.
18. The term completely reversed cycling
is used to describe a situation of 𝑆# =
0, or 𝑅 = −1, as in Fig. 4(a). Also, zero-
to-tension refers to cases of 𝑆#&' = 0,
or R = 0, as in Fig.4(c).
Fig 4
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 Stress vs Life (S-N) Curves
1. If a test specimen of a material or an
engineering component is subjected
to a sufficiently severe cyclic stress, a
fatigue crack or other damage will
develop, leading to complete failure
of the member.
2. If the test is repeated at a higher
stress level, the number of cycles to
failure will be smaller. Fig 5a
3. The results of such tests from a
number of different stress levels may
be plotted to obtain a stress–life
curve, also called an S-N curve. The
amplitude of stress or nominal stress,
𝑆$ , is commonly plotted versus the
number of cycles to failure 𝑁/ , as
shown in Figs. 5a and 5b (Rotating
bending test – inset pic)

Fig 5b 14
 Stress vs Life (S-N) Curves
4. In some materials, notably plain- 6. The term fatigue strength is used to
carbon and low-alloy steels, there specify a stress amplitude value from
appears to be a distinct stress level an S-N curve at a particular life of
below which fatigue failure does not
interest. Hence, the fatigue strength
occur under ordinary conditions.
at 107 cycles is simply the stress
5. This is illustrated in Fig. 6, where the
amplitude corresponding to 𝑁/ = 107.
S-N curve appears to become flat and
to asymptotically approach the stress 7. Other terms used with S-N curves
amplitude labeled 𝑆0 . include high-cycle fatigue and low
6. Such lower limiting stress amplitudes cycle fatigue.
are called fatigue limits or endurance
limits. For test specimens without
notches and with a smooth surface
finish, these are denoted 𝑆0 and are
often considered to be material
properties.

Fig 6 15
 Stress vs Life (S-N) Curves
8. From Fig 7, the high cycle fatigue identifies situations of long fatigue life where the
stress is sufficiently low that yielding effects do not dominate the behavior.
9. The life where high-cycle fatigue starts varies with material, but is typically in the
range 102 to 104 cycles.
10. In the low-cycle fatigue range, the more general strain-based approach is
particularly useful, as this deals specifically with the effects of plastic deformation.

Fig 7

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 How to use S-N curve
11. If S-N data are found to approximate
𝑆! 𝑆!
a straight line on a log–linear plot
(Figs 7b), the following equation can
be fitted to obtain a mathematical
representation of the curve:
𝑆$ = 𝐶 + 𝐷 log 𝑁/ --- (7)
Where C and D are fitting constants
12. For data approximating a straight line
on a log–log plot (Fig 7c), the
corresponding equation is:
𝑆$ = 𝐴×𝑁/1 ---(8)
But usually used as following Basquin
(1910) because in a fully reversed cycle

𝑆!
Fig 7
𝑆$ =Δ𝑆/2:
3
𝑆$ = 𝑆/2 2𝑁/ --- (9)
The fitting constants for the two form are
related by:
𝐴 = 23 𝑆/2 and 𝐵 = 𝑏 ---(10)
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 How to use S-N curve
1
13. Constants for Eqs. (8) and (9) are
given in Table 1 for several
engineering metals.
14. These are based on fitting test data
for unnotched axial specimens tested
under completely reversed (𝑆# = 0)
loading. It is noteworthy that Eq. 9
has been widely adopted, with values
of 𝑆/2 and 𝑏 for 𝑆# = 0 being tabulated
as materials properties.

Attn: 𝜎 symbol in table is similar to 𝑆 in the

lecture note.
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 Example 1
Some values of stress amplitude and corresponding cycles to failure are given in Table
2 from tests on the AISI 4340 steel of Table 1 (see pg 18 of this lecture note). The tests
were done on unnotched, axially loaded specimens under zero mean stress.
(a) Plot these data on log–log coordinates. If this trend seems to represent a straight
line, obtain rough values for the constants for A and B of Eq. 8 from two widely
separated points on a line drawn through the data.
(b) Obtain refined values for A and B, using a linear least-squares fit of log 𝑁/ versus
log 𝑆$ . Table 2

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 Example 1 - Solution

Eq. 9.6 (in Dowling) = Eq. 8 (pg 17 of this lecture note)

Eq. 9.7 (in Dowling) = Eq. 9 (pg 17 of this lecture note)
Eq. 9.8 (in Dowling) = Eq. 10 (pg 17 of this lecture note)

Attn: 𝜎 symbol in solution is similar to

𝑆 symbol in the lecture note.
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 Example 2
A mild steel shaft has a pulley mounted at each end and is supported symmetrically in between
two bearings housings. When rotating under load the shaft will be subjected to a cyclical bending
moment of +/- 1.2 kN.m
Using a safety factor of 2 and the data for material as shown below; Determine a suitable
diameter for the shaft for infinite fatigue life.

Hints to solution:
1) Sketch the problem.
2) State all info given in the
problem
3) State the probable
equations to be used in the
solution.
4) Solve the problem using
info from item 1-3 above.

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 Example 2-solution
From Fig.7, the fatigue limit for infinite life is approximately
+/- 190MN/m2 and using a factor of 2, the design stress will
Q1: A mild steel shaft has a pulley mounted at each end and is
be +/- 95 MN/m2.
supported symmetrically in between two bearings housings.
When rotating under load the shaft will be subjected to a
The bending relationship is
cyclical bending moment of +/- 1.2 kN.m
Using a safety factor of 2 and the data for material as shown
below; Determine a suitable diameter for the shaft for infinite
fatigue life. where

Which for a shaft diameter of D gives:

Dia = D
Sketch the problem A

A Section A-A
Bearing 1 Bearing 2

Pulley 22
Check out Exercise 7 problems on e-learning at week 13
- You have to do within 20 mins
- You need to submit your solution on power point and
provide a recorded voice to explain your answers to the
questions.

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