Issue 31

J.A.F.O. Correia et alii, Frattura ed Integrità Strutturale, 31 (2015) 80-96; DOI: 10.3221/IGF-ESIS.31.07 85 to the same fatigue life. The SWT-N and ε a -N fields exhibit similar characteristics. Therefore the p-ε-N field proposed by Castillo and Fernández-Canteli [20] may be extended to represent the p-SWT-N field as:         0 0 * * 0 0 log log ( ; ) 1 exp log log f f f N N SWT SWT p F N SWT N N SWT SWT                           (12) where p is the probability of failure, N 0 and SWT 0 are normalizing values, and λ , δ and β are the non-dimensional Weibull model parameters. Similarly to the p-ε-N field, the physical meaning of the parameters from Eq. (12) (see Fig. 3) are: N 0 : Threshold value of lifetime; SWT 0 : fatigue limit of SWT ; λ, δ and β : Weibull distribution parameters. Eq. (12) has also a dimensionless form and reveals that the probability of failure p depends only on the * * SWT N f product, where   0 * log NN N f f  and   0 * log SWT SWT SWT  that is: * * * * * ~ ( , , ) ~ , , f f N SWT W N W SWT SWT              (13) i.e., * * SWT N f follows a Weibull distribution. The parameters log N 0 and log ε a0 of the p-ε a -N model, log N 0 and log SWT 0 of the p-SWT-N model can be estimated by least square method. The Weibull parameters can be estimated using the maximum likelihood method [27, 28]. Log N f * SWT 0 N 0 p=0 p=0.05 p=0.5 p=0.95 Log SWT*   Figure 3: Percentile curves representing the relationship between dimensionless lifetime, N f * , and the SWT* damage parameter: p - SWT - N f field. P ROCEDURE TO GENERATE PROBABILISTIC FATIGUE CRACK PROPAGATION FIELDS he procedure proposed to derive probabilistic fatigue crack propagation fields may be summarized into the following steps: 1) Estimation of the Weibull parameters for the p-SWT-N or p-ε a -N fields, using experimental ε a -N or SWT-N data from smooth specimens; 2) Application of the UniGrow model together with the probabilistic fatigue damage models; 3) Computation of the p-da/dN-  K-R fields. The UniGrow model was implemented in a worksheet, supported on VBA programming, specifically developed for Compact Tension (CT) specimens. The input data are the material properties, loads, dimensions of the CT specimen, including the initial and final crack size to be simulated. Additionally, the elementary material block size, ρ* , is required. This parameter may be evaluated by a trial and error procedure in order the numerical results fit satisfactorily the T