Fatigue crack growth in bearing steel under cyclic mode II + static biaxial compression

TL;DR

This study investigates mode II fatigue crack growth in bearing steels under cyclic reversed shear and static biaxial compression, revealing the influence of stress and friction on crack propagation.

Contribution

It introduces a method combining DIC measurements and FE simulations to derive effective stress intensity factors for mode II crack growth in bearing steels.

Findings

Comprehensive analysis of crack growth under complex loading conditions.

Friction correction improves accuracy of crack growth predictions.

Static biaxial compression influences crack growth direction and rate.

Abstract

Mode II fatigue crack growth under reversed shear and static biaxial compression was investigated in two bearing steels. Many aborted branches, quasi-orthogonal to the main crack, were observed along the crack face. The compressive stress parallel to the main crack hindered the growth of these branches and favored coplanar mode II crack growth. The crack face sliding displacement profiles measured by DIC were used to derive $\Delta_{\rm KII,eff}$, at the main crack tip, using elastic-plastic FE simulations with crack face friction, by an inverse method. Friction corrected crack growth kinetics were obtained for mode II crack growth in both steels.