Fatigue Crack Growth in Fe Mini-Samples Consolidated by Means of Impact Sintering

Abstract

The paper presents the results of fatigue crack growth rate test of iron sinters. The samples were produced by means of the impact sintering. Applied production method allowed to obtain dense sinters with fine grain size resulted from large shear strains. Due to the limited size of the final products the mechanical tests were carried out in mini-samples. Optical, non-contact method of displacement measurement, namely Digital Image Correlation (DIC), was applied for determination of the displacement fields near the crack tip at the maximal force of selected loading cycles. The results of DIC measurement were utilized in the calculations of stress intensity factors and crack tip coordinates by means of the iterative procedure based on inverse method. These parameters were used for measuring crack development rate. There were investigated two types of materials produced by the consolidation of two different kinds of Fe powders and sintered in different temperatures. The results of crack growth rate tests were correlated with the microstructure changes, as well as yield and ultimate strength of the materials.