Abstract
The fatigue crack propagation of 304 austenitic stainless steel was studied both by experiments and numerical simulations. Two methods were applied to simulate the crack propagation: the extended finite element method (XFEM) and the cohesive zone model (CZM). Based on the XFEM, the direct cyclic solver was used to simulate the fatigue crack propagation. Based on the CZM, the VUMAT subroutine was used to describe the crack tip constitutive equation during fatigue crack propagation, and the mechanical properties of the crack tip were simulated. The effects of different frequency, f, and stress ratio, R, on the fatigue crack growth life were studied by XFEM and CZM separately and compared with the experimental results. Results show that the crack propagation path simulated by the XFEM agrees well with the experimental result, but the deviation of the fatigue life between the simulated results and the experimental results is large. The CZM model can predict the crack propagation life very well in comparison with the experimental data, but it has certain limitations because the crack propagation path is preset.
Highlights
The pressure equipment will crack under cyclic loadings, even when the loadings are lower than the yield strengths of the materials
(2) The simulated results with the XFEM are in good agreement with the experimental data in the crack stability extension period
The crack propagation path simulated by the XFEM model agrees well methods, XFEM and cohesive zone method (CZM), some conclusions about the research content of this paper are obtained: with the experimental result, but the predicted fatigue life is not accurate
Summary
The pressure equipment will crack under cyclic loadings, even when the loadings are lower than the yield strengths of the materials. There are two main methods for simulating crack propagation: cohesive zone method (CZM) and extended finite element method (XFEM). Saeid Enayatpour et al [21] simulated the initiation and propagation of thermally induced fractures in tight formations, using the CZM, and demonstrated that CZM delivers results for the challenging fracture propagation problem of similar accuracy to the XFEM while reducing complexity and computational effort Both the CZM and the XFEM have been widely applied, and they have their own advantages and disadvantages in the simulation of crack propagation. The comparisons of these two methods have not been studied so far In this study, both the XFEM and the CZM were used to simulate the fatigue crack propagation of the compact tensilespecimens, respectively. The advantages and disadvantages of these two methods in the fatigue crack growth simulations were analyzed
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