Abstract
The fatigue failure of rubber composite materials such as belt and tire is often initiated from the steel cord inserted as a reinforcement. It is well known that the inserted steel cord is often damaged by the bending. However, there are many deformation modes in the deformed belt and tire. Especially, shearing may become an important factor for the fatigue failure. In this study, the stress-initiation mechanism in the steel cord was investigated under shearing condition using FEM analysis.
