Endurance limit of ground and TIG dressed steel welded joints under proportional loading

Post weld treatment methods such as disk and burr grinding or TIG dressing improve the fatigue performance of steel welded joints. As the crack like defects at the weld toes are removed, a significant increase in fatigue strength and particularly in the endurance limit is achieved. This improvement in the fatigue behaviour is currently considered by bonus factors based on general experimental observations. No code-based design approach for the assessment of the endurance limit of these components is available currently. As the fatigue behavior of these types of welded joints is similar to that of non-welded and notched components established design methodologies, such as the local strain approach, are appropriate tools for these purposes. Furthermore, this design approach is open to extension to the finite life region and even the low cycle fatigue regime.