Behavior of Fatigue Crack around a Hole under Biaxial Loading: Effect of Biaxial Static Load

Abstract

Fatigue crack initiation and propagation behavior around a hole subjected to various biaxial fatigue loading modes has been investigated considering the effect of the biaxial static stress. Two different biaxial loading systems, i.e. cyclic tensile loading with static torsional load and cyclic torsional loading with static tensile load, were employed to thin-walled tubular specimens with a circular notch. Variation of the initiaiton and propagation directions of the crack around a hole under these loading ssytems was examined. The initiation directions were observed using replication technique and the crack propagation was measured by two crack gages mounted near the notch. It was found that the biaxial static stress superimposed on the cyclic tensile or torsional loading tests has no influence on the initiation and propagation directions of the cracks around a hole. The fatigue crack initiation and propagation direction under cyclic loading with biaxial static load can be very well explained by the maximum of tangential stress range, Dsqq,max. Furthermore, it was shown that the fatigue crack growth rates under biaixial faigue loading becomes higher with increment of biaxial static load.