Ciro Santus

Hydrogen Embrittlement of Automotive Advanced High-Strength Steels

Advanced high-strength steels (AHSS) have a better combination between strength and ductility than conventional HSS, and higher crash resistances are obtained in concomitance with weight reduction of car structural components. These steels have been developed in the last few decades, and their use is rapidly increasing. Notwithstanding, some of their important features have to be still understood and studied in order to completely characterize their service behavior. In particular, the high mechanical resistance of AHSS makes hydrogen-related problems a great concern for this steel grade. This article investigates the hydrogen embrittlement (HE) of four AHSS steels. The behavior of one transformation induced plasticity (TRIP), two martensitic with different strength levels, and one hot-stamping steels has been studied using slow strain rate tensile (SSRT) tests on electrochemically hydrogenated notched samples. The embrittlement susceptibility of these AHSS steels has been correlated mainly to their strength level and to their microstructural features. Finally, the hydrogen critical concentrations for HE, established by SSRT tests, have been compared to hydrogen contents absorbed during the painting process of a body in white (BIW) structure, experimentally determined during a real cycle in an industrial plant.

A procedure for evaluating high residual stresses using the blind hole drilling method, including the effect of plasticity

When the blind hole drilling method is used to evaluate high residual stresses in a metallic component, plastic relaxed strain can be produced in the hole region because of the stress concentration that causes the local stresses to reach yielding. By assuming a linear–elastic behaviour of the material, a significant error can result. The present paper analyses the phenomenon of the plasticity locally induced by the introduction of the hole and proposes a procedure to take into account its effects on the residual stress evaluation. The correcting procedure has been developed by elaborating a large database of elastic–plastic finite element analyses performed considering a wide range of material properties and testing parameters, including all the strain gauge rosettes commonly used. As plasticity induces non-linearity in the relationship between residual stress and relaxed strain, the superposition principle cannot be applied, so the correction is limited to uniform in-depth residual stress fields. However, four hole depths were considered and the related correcting procedures were provided. When variable through thickness residual stress is expected, and high residual stress is confined near the surface region, the correction procedure can be applied to an initial limited depth.

Experimental Verification of the Hole Drilling Plasticity Effect Correction

The Hole Drilling Method introduces a hole in a (residual) stressed volume of material, typically a metal, then a stress concentration follows. A portion of the volume near the hole can experience a stress concentration and then plasticity. The relaxed strains measured by the rosette strain gage grids are then affected by this plasticity volume especially when the residual stress is quite large with respect to the material yield stress. This is the so called Hole Drilling Plasticity Effect. The authors recently proposed a numerical procedure to correct this perturbation effect and retrieve more accurate residual stress components values. An experimental validation of this correction procedure is reported in the paper.

First-order correction to counter the effect of eccentricity on the hole-drilling integral method with strain-gage rosettes:

The offset between the hole and the centre of the strain-gage rosette is unavoidable, although usually small, in the hole-drilling technique for residual stress evaluation. In this article, we revised the integral method described in the ASTM E837 standard and we recalculated the calibration coefficients. The integral method was then extended by taking into account the two eccentricity components, and a more general procedure was proposed including the first-order correction. A numerical validation analysis was used to consolidate the procedure and evaluate the residual error after implementing the correction. The values of this error resulted limited to a few percentage points, even for eccentricities larger than the usual experimental values. The narrow eccentricity limit claimed by the standard, to keep the maximum error lower than 10%, can now be considered extended by approximately a factor of 10, after implementing the proposed correcting procedure, proving that the effect of the eccentricity is mainly linear within a relatively large range.

Robot Assisted Modal Analysis on a Stationary Bladed Wheel

This paper shows an automated procedure to experimentally find the eigenmodes of a bladed wheel with highly three-dimensional geometry. The stationary wheel is supported in free-free conditions, neglecting stress-stiffening effects. The single input / multiple output approach was followed. The vibration speed was measured by means of a laser-Doppler vibrometer, and an anthropomorphic robot was used for accurate orientation and positioning of the measuring laser beam, allowing multiple measurements during a limited testing time. The vibration at corresponding points on each blade was measured and the data elaborated in order to find the initial (lower frequency) modes. These modal shapes were then compared to finite element simulations and accurate frequency matching and exact number of nodal diameters obtained. Being the modes cyclically harmonic, the complex formulation could be attractive, being not affected by the angular phase of the mode representation. Nevertheless, stationary modes were experimentally detected, rather than rotating, and then the real representation was necessary. The discrete Fourier transform of the blade displacements easily allowed to find both the angular phase and the correct number of nodal diameters. Successful MAC experimental to analytical comparison was finally obtained with the real representation after introducing the proper angular phase for each mode.© 2014 ASME

METAL TO METAL FLANGES LEAKAGE ANALYSIS

The use of a gasket made in soft material is not recommended for large size centrifugal compressor case flange. The two case halves are assembled with bolted flanges and leakage is prevented by the metal‐to‐metal contact under pressure. The prediction of the leakage condition is an important engineering issue for this technology. In the paper an original model able to predict the leakage condition, based on a Fracture Mechanics approach, is presented. The flange surfaces interface is regarded as a crack which can be partially open. As the flanges can not transfer tensile traction, the extension of the open zone, i.e. the crack length, is obtained by the condition that the Stress Intensity Factor K is zero. An analytical model, based on the Weight Function technique, was applied to find the stress intensity K, and then to predict the leakage condition. The paper illustrates a validation of the proposed model by the comparison with a nonlinear Finite Element analysis and the results of a full scale experimental test series obtained by a research collaboration between industry and academia. The leakage pressure predicted by the model is in good agreement with the numerical prediction and the experimental results.

High Load Ratio Fatigue Strength and Mean Stress Evolution of Quenched and Tempered 42CrMo4 Steel

The fatigue strength at a high number of cycles with initial elastic–plastic behavior was experimentally investigated on quenched and tempered 42CrMo4 steel. Fatigue tests on unnotched specimens were performed both under load and strain controls, by imposing various levels of amplitude and with several high load ratios. Different ratcheting and relaxation trends, with significant effects on fatigue, are observed and discussed, and then reported in the Haigh diagram, highlighting a clear correlation with the Smith–Watson–Topper model. High load ratio tests were also conducted on notched specimens with C (blunt) and V (sharp) geometries. A Chaboche model with three parameter couples was proposed by fitting plain specimen cyclic and relaxation tests, and then finite element analyses were performed to simulate the notched specimen test results. A significant stress relaxation at the notch root became clearly evident by reporting the numerical results in the Haigh diagram, thus explaining the low mean stress sensitivity of the notched specimens.

Bending Test Rig for Validating the Hole Drilling Method Residual Stress Measurement

This paper shows a large validation activity of the strain gage Hole Drilling Method. The residual stress measurements can not be validated easily, unless with Round Robin activity and/or comparison with other residual stress measurements such as X-ray diffraction. An accurate validation procedure is reported in the present paper, using abending test rig. The bending stress experimentally simulated a residual stress (known with uncertainty lower than 1%) that was considered as the reference stress distribution. The results showed very accurate measurement in terms of relaxed strain distributions, that were compared with the prediction obtained with the Influence Function technique. The differences were in the order of 0.5 microepsilon as standard deviation on a large number of tests. The bending stress prediction was consequently very accurate and the stress differences were as small as 1 MPa showing the accuracy potentiality of the method.

Fine Increment Hole-Drilling Method for Residual Stress Measurement, Proposal of a Calibrating Apparatus

Hole drilling is one of the most widely used technique for residual stress measurements, due to its precision and low cost. Standard ASTM E 837 [1] is limited to the uniform distribution of residual stresses, whereas it is well known that residual stresses usually feature high gradient along the depth, particularly if residual stresses are induced by surface treatments such us shot peening. The incremental hole-drilling method can be used to evaluate the not-uniform residual stress distribution as shown by Schajer [2,3]. The strain measurement is repeated at different hole depths to achieve information on the residual stress gradient, from relaxed surface strain. Influence functions for the incremental hole drilling are proposed by Beghini and Bertini [4] by which the relaxed strain can be evaluated analytically if the residual stress distributions are known for any kind of rosette, hole diameter and elastic material. Valentini [5] has developed an apparatus able to produce fine increment hole drilling, by means of a high speed air turbine drill automatically controlled. Valentini et al. [6] used the appartatus to experimentally show the effects on residual stresses measurement by the hole drilling such as eccentricity and sequence of increments steps.

A fretting fatigue setup for testing shrink-fit connections and experimental evidence of the strength enhancement induced by deep rolling

Fretting tests are usually performed on flat specimens with lateral contacting pads. The shrink-fitted connection, which experiences fretting at the edge of the contact, prompted the alternative use of a round-shaped specimen. This simplified the equipment and provided an accurate alignment between the fretting specimen and the external hub which plays the role of the pad. The deep rolling treatment can also be efficiently applied to a round shape, which would otherwise be difficult on the flat specimen geometry. After introducing this solution for fretting testing, the paper shows an experimental campaign on three shrink-fitted connections with different sizes and material combinations. There was a significant improvement in fretting fatigue strength, induced by the deep rolling, for all three specimen types. Finally, scanning electron microscopic analyses provided insights into the fretting fatigue nucleation mechanisms both for untreated and deep-rolled specimens.