Effects of Fatigue Calculation Parameters on the Resulting Tests Generated from Fatigue-Based Editing

Building fatigue tests for components or systems involves determining the loading content to use to attain a desired amount of projected damage. A test-building process using field/proving ground histories or simulations thereof as the loading basis involves several decisions during fatigue calculation steps that could affect final test content. This paper quantifies the relative effects of fatigue analysis parameter decisions on test loads and test time. The parameters discussed here include fatigue property parameters, “cutoff” levels, and scaling or notch factor application to strain data. Specific cases are presented to show how all these parameters affect the end tests.