Theoretical fatigue. Effective notch stresses at spot welds
Abstract
Notch stress formulae are derived for the application of a notch stress approach to the fatigue assessment of spot welds. A keyhole notch is assumed to describe the edge of the weld spot between the overlapping plates. The stress fields at the keyhole notch under 'singular' and 'non-singular' in-plane loading modes inclusive of the stress concentration factors K-t are derived from the relevant Airy stress functions. The formulae are applied to typical loading cases of spot welds and compared with finite element solutions. Fatigue-effective notch stresses inclusive of fatigue notch factors K-f are calculated by applying the microstructural support hypothesis of Neuber. The notch stresses at the keyhole are also derived for out-of-plane shear loading based on the relevant harmonic stress functions. The multiaxial notch stresses at the weld spot edge are thus completely described.
