Fatigue crack growth behaviour in Ti6Al4V alloy specimens produced by selective laser melting

Abstract

The current study presents the fatigue crack growth behaviour of titanium alloy Ti6Al4V parts manufactured by selective laser melting (SLM), obtained as standard 6 mm thick compact specimens (CT). Both the crack propagation under constant amplitude loading and the transient crack growth behaviour after the application of overloads were studied. The effect of the mean stress and the transient retardation behaviour were analysed using the crack closure parameter, obtained both by compliance and digital image correlation techniques. A reduced crack closure level for the stress ratio $$\hbox {R}=0$$ was detected and for $$\hbox {R}=0.4$$ no crack closure was observed. The digital image correlation technique showed better results in the Paris regime and during the transient retardation behaviour. The overload application produced crack growth retardation due to the increase of the crack closure effect. The failure surfaces showed a transgranular crack growth in $$\upbeta $$ phase contouring the martensitic $$\upalpha $$ phase.