Peridynamic simulation of fatigue crack propagation of REBCO tapes

High temperature superconducting tapes are inevitably subjected to fatigue loads when operating in complex environments, which are caused by periodic mechanical, thermal or electromagnetic loading. Peridynamics is a non-local theory, which has the advantage in dealing with the damage prediction. This paper introduces a peridynamics (PD)-based numerical analysis method for addressing crack propagation behavior in superconducting tapes under fatigue loading. A bond fatigue criterion based on the Forman’s law is adopted in this study. The effectiveness of the peridynamic approach in addressing fatigue problems is verified through the experiment results. Subsequently, the crack propagation of REBCO tapes under cyclic loading under displacement conditions is experimentally obtained and simulated. At the end of the paper, the mechanical fatigue behavior of several types of cracks that may arise in engineering application is investigated, such as single oblique edge crack and multiple parallel edge cracks.