Efficient Monitoring of Loads and Stresses Under Service and Test Conditions

With the Durability Transfer Concept a new methodology is presented, in which the fatigue damage under operational loading conditions in different areas of a vehicle is determined from the accelerations measured on the suspension. Thus long term measurements can be performed extremely cost efficient with only a 3 axis accelerometer on the suspension and a data logger. The accelerations are online processed, rain flow counted and by damage accumulation evaluated. The effort for the instrumentation of a vehicle and during measurements is reduced to a minimum. Counting into the rainflow matrices allows measurements without time limit. From the calculated damages of the accelerations the damage evolution of other quantities all over the vehicle is derived based on the durability transfer functions identified from short term measurements. This concept is especially favorable for investigation of the loading and stress conditions under customer usage conditions, under specific mission profiles or under usage conditions in different countries.