Fatigue life predictions for irradiated stainless steels considering void swellings effects

Abstract

The objective of this study is to estimate fatigue life of irradiated austenitic stainless steels types 304, 304L, and 316, which are extensively used as structural alloys in the internal elements of nuclear reactors. These reactor components are typically subjected to a long-term exposure to irradiation at elevated temperature along with repeated loadings during operation. Additionally, it is known that neutron irradiation can cause the formation and growth of microscopic defects or swellings in the materials, which may have a potential to deteriorate the mechanical properties of the materials. In this study, uniaxial fatigue models were used to predict fatigue properties based only on simple monotonic properties including ultimate tensile strength and Brinell hardness. Two existing models, the Bäumel–Seeger uniform material law and the Roessle–Fatemi hardness method, were employed and extended to include the effects of test temperature, neutron irradiation fluence, irradiation-induced helium and irradiation-induced swellings on fatigue life of austenitic stainless steels. The proposed models provided reasonable fatigue life predictions compared with the experimental data for all selected materials.