Abstract
AbstractAcoustic emission (AE) has been increasingly used for assessment and prediction of fatigue cracks in steel bridge members. Fatigue cracks develop at the transverse weld toe of stiffeners, attachments, and cover plates in steel bridge members. Effectiveness of AE to assess fatigue crack initiation from weld toe is investigated in this study, and an attempt is made to predict the crack growth behavior using AE signal features. Cruciform specimens consisting of a single tension pull plate with transverse fillet-welded plates attached at midspan are tested in this study. The transverse plates represent stiffeners and/or short attachments typical of welded steel bridge details. The specimen provides realistic initial conditions of fatigue crack initiation and growth from high stress concentration regions. Consequently, AE waveform characteristics representative of those expected on bridge structures are produced. Accurate stress intensity factor values are difficult to obtain because of the small, nonu...
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