About the Challenge in Determining the Cyclic Material Behavior of Aluminum Alloys for Numerical Fatigue Analyses

Abstract

Knowledge of the cyclic material behavior is needed for a proper estimation of fatigue life. Depending on the design concept, different equations are required to describe the fatigue behavior. For the local strain concept, the cyclic material properties, according to the rules of Manson-Coffin-Basquin and Ramberg-Osgood, are very popular. For the stress concept, High Cycle and Very High Cycle Fatigue modifications of the Basquin's rule are used. Basically, these rules were not developed for aluminum alloys and are limited to a small range of fatigue life. Since the 1970s, several ongoing investigations had shown that these rules do not fit the experimental results in a proper way for materials other than standard steels. For this reason, a new method for describing the strain S-N curve and new testing facilities for the experimental investigation of the cyclic material behavior of aluminum alloys, for the whole range of fatigue life, will be presented.