Fretting fatigue of seven wire strands axially loaded in free bending fatigue tests

Technical Meeting - Endurance of Wire Ropes under Fluctuating Tension – Stuttgart 1995

ABSTRACT - Free bending fatigue tests of seven wire strands, axially loaded with a constant force, were carried out. These tests showed evidence of fatigue failures resulting from fretting fatigue damages initiated on the line contacts between the king wire and the helical wires. Moreover, almost all the fatigue breaks are located in the bending plane.

A multiaxial non proportional stress state on the contact surface is calculated over a loading cycle. A way to predict the initiation of fretting fatigue cracks is proposed according to the Brown and Miller's critical shear plane concept. The external loading which corresponds to the fatigue tests, involves a high cycle fatigue regime, the contact conditions, notably the contact area and the coefficient of friction, reach a stabilized state. An application of a multiaxial fatigue damage criterion which is related to uniaxial fatigue limit test data is proposed.

Author(s): Pierre Brevet, Dominique Siegert