Compression pre-cracking to generate near threshold fatigue-crack-growth rates in two aluminum alloys

A test program was conducted to generate threshold and near-threshold data on two aluminum alloys: 2324-T39 and 7075-T7351, using compression pre-cracking constant-amplitude (CPCA) threshold testing procedures. Compact tension specimens were tested under stress ratios (R) of 0.1, 0.4, 0.7 or 0.8. Results were compared with either existing load-reduction data from the literature or with data that were generated using the load-reduction procedures. On the 2324 alloy, very little difference was observed between the load-reduction and CPCA test methods, although the CPCA test method consistently produced slightly lower thresholds or slightly faster crack-growth rates. But on the 2324 alloy, most of the load-reduction tests used extremely low initial ΔK values to grow the cracks under load reduction, which may explain the reason for the agreement. These low ΔK values were achieved by using compression pre-cracking to initiate a crack at the crack-starter notch. In contrast, the 7075 alloy showed very large differences between the CPCA and load-reduction results in the near-threshold and threshold regimes for R=0.1 and 0.4. Results under high R conditions (R=0.7) agreed very well between the two threshold test methods. An expression was also developed to generate fatigue-crack-growth-rate data using the CPCA threshold test method that would be unaffected by compressive yielding at the crack-starter notch and produce ‘steady-state’ constant-amplitude data in the near threshold regime.