Editorial on Special Issue “Fatigue and Fracture Behaviour of Additive Manufacturing Mechanical Components”

Abstract

This Special Issue presents the latest advances in the field of fatigue and fracture performances of additively manufactured mechanical components, including components made of traditional materials (metals, sintered steels, etc.) but undergoing complex loading conditions (multiaxial fatigue and mixed mode fracture). This Special Issue is composed of seven papers covering new insights in structural and material engineering. The advent of additive manufacturing (AM) processes applied to the fabrication of structural components creates the need for design methodologies and structural optimization approaches that take into account the specific characteristics of the process. While AM processes give unprecedented geometrical design freedom, which can result in significant reductions of component weight (e.g., through part count reduction), they have implications in the fatigue and fracture strength due to residual stresses and microstructural features. This is due to stress concentration effects and anisotropy that still need research. The papers of this Special Issue report on numerical simulation and experimental work, or a combination of both. The application of damage and fracture mechanics concepts, the appraisal of stress concentration effects, and the consideration of residual stresses and anisotropic behaviour are tackled for a range of structural applications from biomedical engineering to aerospace components.