Effects of Mean Strain on the Random Cyclic Stress-Strain Relations of 0Cr18Ni10Ti Pipe Steel

Experimental study is performed for the effects of the mean strain on the random cyclic stress-strain relations of the new nuclear material, 0Cr18Ni10Ti pipe steel. From saving the size of specimens, an improved maximum likelihood fatigue test method is proposed to operate the present strain-controlled fatigue tests. Six straining ratios, -1, -0.52, -0.22, 0.029, 0.18, and 0.48, respectively, are applied to study the effects. Fatigue test has been carried out on totally 104 specimens. The test results reveal that the material exhibits a Masing behaviour and the saturation hysteresis loops under the six ratios hold an entirely relaxation effect of mean stress. There is no effectively method for the description of the mean straining effects under this case. Previous Zhao's random stress-strain relations are therefore applied to characterizing effectively the scattering test data under the six ratios on a basis of Ramberg-Osgood equation. Then the effects of the ratios are analyzed respectively on the average stress amplitudes, the standard deviations of the stress amplitudes, and the stress amplitudes under different survival probabilities and confidences. The results reveal that the ratios act a relatively decreasing effect to the stress amplitudes under higher survival probabilities and confidences. The strongest effect appears at the ratio of 0.029, and a weaker effect acts as the distance increase of the ratio from the zero. In addition, it is indicated that the effects from the sense of average fatigue lives might result in a wrong conclusion. The effects can be appropriately assessed from a probabilistic sense to take into account the scattering regularity of test data and the size of sampling.