The fatigue behavior of self-piercing riveting (SPR) joint, joining aluminum alloy 6111T4 and steel HSLA340 sheets with lapshear geometry was investigated in this paper. Sheet crack was the dominant failure mode, while unexpected rivet shank failure tended to occur under high loading level. Fretting wear was observed at interface of aluminum and steel layers, as well as at rivet and sheets under sinusoidal cyclic tension-tension loading. An energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis of fretting debris revealed the presence of oxide of aluminum and zinc. Fretting was shown to be critical as crack initiation spot. In sheet failure mode, micro cracks were found to initiate at early stage, and crack initiation life was much shorter than crack growth life.

Volume Subject Area:
Materials: Genetics to Structures
Topics:
Fatigue, Metals, Fracture (Materials), Aluminum, Failure mechanisms, Rivets, Steel, Tension, Aluminum alloys, Failure, Geometry, Joining, Microcracks, Riveting, Wear, X-rays
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