Effect of Strain Amplitudes and Mean Strain Values on Fatigue Life at Elevated Temperature

This paper shows randomness effects of loading amplitude and mean value of displacement-controlled loading history for perforated plates made of SUS304 stainless steel at elevated temperature of 550°C. Under the random wave of strain amplitude, the fracture behavior at elevated temperature environment is clarified by measuring the load-deflection curve at all cycles. The data of experiments were evaluated by Miner’s rule, which has been established as an evaluation method for load variation problem. Number of cycles to fracture is compared to show the good agreement with the Best Fit Fatigue curve (BFF). Peak count method also was used in calculating frequency of the strain in order to evaluate Miner’s rule, and the local strain concentration is calculated based on Stress Redistribution Locus (SRL) method. The other object of this study is to evaluate effect of mean value of strain in loading diagram on fatigue life. The mean strain were used for the cases of R = −0.0, −0.2, −0.4, −0.8 and −1.0. The crack length is measured by using photographs with the CCD video camera at a constant frequency. From the measurement, it is found that the number of cycles to failure is reduced when the absolute of value of mean strain is decreased. And cracks develop at both sides around the hole, but the growth of each crack may not be symmetric. By using these inelastic strain amplitude and crack initiation cycle, the experimented results are shown at the present study.