VARIATION OF OVALIZATION FOR SHARP-NOTCHED CIRCULAR TUBES UNDER CYCLIC BENDING

In this paper, an experimental investigation on the variation of ovalization for sharp-notched circular tubes subjected to cyclic bending is discussed. The tube bending machine and curvature-ovalization measurement apparatus were used to test the unnotched and sharp-notched 304 stainless steel tubes. For sharp-notched tubes, five different notch depths (0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8 and 1.0mm) were considered in this study. It was found that the experimental curve of the ovalization and the number of cycles could be divided into three stages-an initial, secondary and tertiary stage. An empirical relationship was proposed for simulating the aforementioned curve for the initial and secondary stages in this study. It has been shown that the derived empirical relationship was in good agreement with the experimental data.