Article ID: ISIJINT-2019-823
We have constructed an automatic in situ observation system for monitoring the behavior of small fatigue cracks at the microstructural level that, when used in conjunction with a digital-image correlation (DIC) technique, permits the continuous and automatic tracking and recording of microscopic deformation behavior. To verify the effectiveness of this system, we applied it to the evaluation of small fatigue cracks in heat-treated low-carbon steel. The results confirmed that our system can be used in the automatic tracking and recording of the initiation and early growth behavior of microstructurally small fatigue cracks. By the use of DIC analysis, we also succeeded in visualizing the opening-and-closing behavior of small fatigue cracks as well as the behavior of microscopic microstructural deformations, such as inhomogeneous strain concentrations, that caused the fatigue cracks. Although the early-stage growth of fatigue cracks propagates faster than that of long cracks, it is consistent with long-crack data if the effective stress intensity factor range ΔKeff which calculated by crack opening stress measured by DIC is used.
