At high-strength steels very high cycle fatigue (VHCF) failure always occurs at subsurface inclusions. As a result, the failure shows large scatter and is not observable or predictable prior to failure. In order to understand the mechanisms leading to crack initiation in VHCF, it is necessary to make the failure observable. Within our work, a new testing procedure is introduced that enables the simulation of subsurface conditions at the surface and thereby the localisation of the failure. Therefore, specimens with artificial surface defects were tested in vacuum atmosphere. In our work, we will show the testing procedure and the validation of the results. Further, the transferability of our results on the failure at subsurface inclusions is discussed.
This paper is part of a Themed Issue on Recent developments in bearing steels.
ShiozawaK., LuL. and IshiharaS.: ‘S–N curve characteristics and subsurface crack initiation behaviour in ultra-long life fatigue of a high carbon-chromium bearing steel’, Fatigue Fract. Eng. Mater. Struct., 2001, 24, 781–790. doi: 10.1046/j.1460-2695.2001.00459.x
2.
SakaiT.: ‘Review and prospects for current studies on very high cycle fatigue of metallic materials for machine structural use’, J. Solid Mech. Mater. Eng., 2009, 3, (3), 425–439. doi: 10.1299/jmmp.3.425
3.
Bacher-HoechstM. and IsslerS.: ‘How to deal with very high cycle fatigue (VHCF) effects in practical application’, VHCF 5, Berlin, 2011, DVM, pp. 45–50.
4.
KovacsS., BeckT. and SingheiserL.: ‘Influence of mean stresses on fatigue life and damage of a turbine blade steel in the VHCF-regime’, Int. J. Fatigue, 2013, 49, 90–99. doi: 10.1016/j.ijfatigue.2012.12.012
5.
MurakamiY., KodamaS. and KonumaS.: ‘Quantitative evaluation of effects of non-metallic inclusions on fatigue strength of high strength steels. I: Basic fatigue mechanism and evaluation of correlation between the fatigue fracture and the size and location of non-metallic inclusions’, Int. J. Fatigue, 1989, 11, (5), 291–298. doi: 10.1016/0142-1123(89)90054-6
6.
MurakamiY.: ‘Analysis of stress intensity factors of model I, II, III for inclined surface cracks of arbitrary shape’, Eng. Fract. Mech., 1985, 22, (1), 101–114. doi: 10.1016/0013-7944(85)90163-8
7.
GradP., ReuscherB., BrodyanskiA., KopnarskiM. and KerscherE.: ‘Mechanism of fatigue crack initiation and propagation in the very high cycle fatigue regime of high-strength steels’, Scr. Mater., 2012, 67, 838–841. doi: 10.1016/j.scriptamat.2012.07.049
8.
SakaiT., SatoY. and OgumaN.: ‘Characteristic S–N properties of high-carbon–chromium-bearing steel under axial loading in long-life fatigue’, Fatigue Fract. Eng. Mater. Struct., 2002, 25, 765–773. doi: 10.1046/j.1460-2695.2002.00574.x
9.
MurakamiY., NomotoT. and UedaT.: ‘Factors influencing the mechanism of superlong fatigue failure’, Fatigue Fract. Eng. Mater. Struct., 1999, 22, 581–590. doi: 10.1046/j.1460-2695.1999.00187.x
10.
OchiY., MatsumuraT., MasakiK. and YoshidaS.: ‘High-cycle rotating bending fatigue property in very long-life regime of high-strength steels’, Fatigue Fract. Eng. Mater. Struct., 2002, 25, 823–830. doi: 10.1046/j.1460-2695.2002.00575.x
11.
MurakamiY., YokoyamaN. N. and NagataJ.: ‘Mechanism of fatigue failure in ultralong life regime’, Fatigue Fract. Eng. Mater. Struct., 2002, 25, 735–746. doi: 10.1046/j.1460-2695.2002.00576.x
12.
ShiozawaK., MoriiY., NishinoS. and LuL.: ‘Subsurface crack initiation and propagation mechanism in high-strength steel in a very high cycle fatigue regime’, Int. J. Fatigue, 2006, 28, 1521–1532. doi: 10.1016/j.ijfatigue.2005.08.015
13.
NakamuraT., OgumaH. and ShinoharaY.: ‘The effect of vacuum-like environment inside sub-surface fatigue crack on the formation of ODA fracture surface in high strength steel’, Procedia Eng., 2010, 2, 2121–2129. doi: 10.1016/j.proeng.2010.03.228
14.
OgumaH. and NakamuraT.: ‘Fatigue crack propagation of Ti-6Al-4V in vacuum environment’, Int. J. Fatigue, 2012, 50, 89–93. doi: 10.1016/j.ijfatigue.2012.02.012
15.
SakaiT., HaradaH. and OgumaN.: ‘Crack initiation mechanism of bearing steel in high cycle fatigue’, in ‘Fracture of nano and engineering materials and structures’, (ed. E. E. Gdoutos), 1129–1130; 2006, Springer, Netherlands. doi: 10.1007/1-4020-4972-2_560
16.
MughrabiH. and HöppelH. W.: ‘Cyclic deformation and fatigue properties of very fine-grained metals and alloys’, Int. J. Fatigue, 2010, 32, (9), 1413–1427. doi: 10.1016/j.ijfatigue.2009.10.007
17.
ChaiG. and ZhouN.: ‘Study of crack initiation or damage in very high cycle fatigue using ultrasonic fatigue test and microstructure analysis’, Ultrasonics, 2013, 53, (8), 1406–1411. doi: 10.1016/j.ultras.2013.05.008
18.
KimH.-K., ChoiM.-I., ChungC.-S. and ShinD. H.: ‘Fatigue properties of ultrafine grained low carbon steel produced by equal channel angular pressing’, Mater. Sci. Eng., A, 2003, 340, (1–2), 243–250. doi: 10.1016/S0921-5093(02)00178-8
19.
GiertlerA., SökerM., DöngesB., IstominK., LudwigW., PietschU., FritzenC. P., ChristH. J. and KruppU.: ‘The significance of local plasticity for the crack initiation process during very high cycle fatigue of high strength steels’, Procedia Mater. Sci., 2014, 3, 1353–1358. doi: 10.1016/j.mspro.2014.06.218
20.
BhadeshiaH. K. D. H.: ‘Steels for bearings’, Prog. Mater. Sci., 2012, 57, (2), 268–435. doi: 10.1016/j.pmatsci.2011.06.002
21.
BillaudeauT. and NadotY.: ‘Support for an environmental effect on fatigue mechanisms in the long life regime’, Int. J. Fatigue, 2004, 26, 839–847. doi: 10.1016/j.ijfatigue.2004.01.005
22.
PetitJ. and Sarrazin-BaudouxC.: ‘An overview on the influence of the atmosphere environment on ultra-high-cycle fatigue and ultra-slow fatigue crack propagation’, Int. J. Fatigue, 2006, 28, 1471–1478. doi: 10.1016/j.ijfatigue.2005.06.057
23.
OgawaT., Stanzl-TscheggS. E. and SchönbauerB. M.: ‘A fracture mechanics approach to interior fatigue crack growth in the very high cycle regime’, Engineering Fracture Mechanics.
24.
Stanzl-TscheggS. and SchönbauerB.: ‘Near-threshold fatigue crack propagation and internal cracks in steel’, Procedia Eng., 2010, 2, 1547–1555. doi: 10.1016/j.proeng.2010.03.167
25.
McGreevyT. E. and SocieF.: ‘Competing roles of microstructure and flaw size’, Fatigue Fract. Eng. Mater. Struct., 1999, 22, 495–508. doi: 10.1046/j.1460-2695.1999.00190.x
26.
Lozano-PerezS.: ‘A guide on FIB preparation of samples containing stress corrosion crack tips for TEM and atom-probe analysis’, Micron, 2008, 39, (3), 320–328. doi: 10.1016/j.micron.2007.12.003
27.
WirthR.: ‘Focused ion beam (FIB) combined with SEM and TEM: advanced analytical tools for studies of chemical composition, microstructure and crystal structure in geomaterials on a nanometre scale’, Chem. Geol., 2009, 261, (3–4), 217–229. doi: 10.1016/j.chemgeo.2008.05.019
28.
NiendorfT., RubitschekF., MaierH. J., CanadincD. and KaramanI.: ‘On the fatigue crack growth–microstructure relationship in ultrafine-grained interstitial-free steel’, J. Mater. Sci., 2010, 45, (17), 4813–4821. doi: 10.1007/s10853-010-4511-7
29.
HähnerP.: ‘A theory of dislocation cell formation based on stochastic dislocation dynamics’, Acta Mater., 1996, 44, (6), 2345–2352. doi: 10.1016/1359-6454(95)00364-9
