Numerical Simulation of High-Cyclic Fatigue in Steel Components

High-cyclic fatigue is one of the most common failure mechanisms of steel components in the PVP industry. Over the last decades several numerical methodologies have been proposed for the analysis and design of steel components against high-cyclic fatigue and a significant number of commercial software tools have been developed in order to assist engineers to simulate high-cycle fatigue cracking in order to provide reliable estimates of their fatigue life. The present paper summarizes recent research, which aims at simulating the development and growth of high cyclic fatigue cracks in steel components using a novel numerical methodology, which employs cohesive finite elements. A robust and efficient numerical algorithm has been developed in order to predict the crack tip position, the crack propagation direction and the crack growth rate in the steel material. The crack growth rate is estimated based on the calculation of J-integral around the crack tip, and a new methodology that allows for an effective loading cycle skipping process is also developed. The proposed methodology has been tested and verified against experimental results performed in our laboratory.