Cyclic stress-strain behaviour under thermomechanical fatigue conditions – Modeling by means of an enhanced multi-component model

Abstract

The cyclic stress-strain behaviour of metals and alloys in cyclic saturation can reasonably be described by means of simple multi-component models, such as the model based on a parallel arrangement of elastic-perfectly plastic elements, which was originally proposed by Masing already in 1923. This model concept was applied to thermomechanical fatigue loading of two metallic engineering materials which were found to be rather oppositional with respect to cyclic plastic deformation. One material is an austenitic stainless steel of type AISI304L which shows dynamic strain aging (DSA) and serves as an example for a rather ductile alloy. A dislocation arrangement was found after TMF testing deviating characteristically from the corresponding isothermal microstructures. The second material is a third-generation near-gamma TiAl alloy which is characterized by a very pronounced ductile-to-brittle transition (DBT) within the temperature range of TMF cycling. Isothermal fatigue testing at temperatures below the DBT temperature leads to cyclic hardening, while cyclic softening was found to occur above DBT. The combined effect under TMF leads to a continuously developing mean stress. The experimental observations regarding isothermal and non-isothermal stress-strain behaviour and the correlation to the underlying microstructural processes was used to further develop the TMF multi-composite model in order to accurately predict the TMF stress-strain response by taking the alloy-specific features into account.