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Abstract

The present studies concentrated on predicting the remaining fatigue life for single fatigue cracks in the Paris regime of macrocrack propagation. Acoustic surface waves were used to interrogate the crack during cyclic fatigue. The inversion of the obtained scattering data provided crack depth and crack length as a function of the number of cycles applied in tension-tension fatigue. Auxiliary experiments were conducted to study the acoustic response of the crack to tensile and compressive loads, thought to open and close the crack. The technique may allow for new insights into the physics of the ldquocrack closurerdquo effect.

Key words  fatigue life - acoustic surface waves - NDE - ultrasonics - cracks

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