Fatigue analysis of welded joints: state of development

The literature on fatigue analysis of welded joints is reviewed, considering mainly papers and books published during the past 10-15 years. After a short introduction, the different approaches for fatigue analyses are covered, i.e. the nominal stress approach, the structural or hot-spot stress approach, the notch stress and notch intensity approach, the notch strain approach and finally the crack propagation approach. Only seam-welded joints are considered, and not the behaviour of spot-welds, which is a very special field. Due to the vast amount of relevant literature, some specific areas are left for other reviews or only touched, i.e. fatigue testing and evaluation, fatigue loading and variable amplitude effects, environmental effects and fatigue reliability. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.