Effect of Residual Stress on Fatigue Failure of Carbonitrided Low-Carbon Steel

The effect of residual stress on fatigue behavior and mechanisms of carbonitrided AISI 1015 steel under uniaxial cyclic loading has been experimentally studied. By progressive removal of thin surface layers using an electropolishing technique and subsequent residual stress measurements using an x-ray diffraction technique, the compressive residual stress at the surface was approximately 900 MPa. The stress decreased toward the center, and became stable tensile residual stress of approximately 20 MPa. The fatigue resistance of carbonitrided AISI 1015 steel was higher than that of AISI 1015 steel due to the presence of compressive residual stress in case layer. The fatigue limit of AISI 1015 steels with and without carbonitriding was 340 and 300 MPa, respectively. Subsurface cracks initiated at the case-core interface, i.e. approximately 400 mu m from the surface. With increasing number of stress cycles, the subsurface cracks coalesced and propagated intergranularly through the case layer. After some incubation cycles, the subsurface cracks reached the surface of specimen, and became a main crack. During this stage, the stress increased, and caused the formation of voids in core material. Consequently, the crack propagated through the core material, interacted with voids, and caused complete fracture.