Abstract
In order to estimate the sliding-rolling contact fatigue life of the surface-hardened sintered roller based on the linear fracture mechanics, the crack propagation behavior was investigated under a sliding-rolling contact condition using the case-hardened steel rollers with three different sizes of fine axial tubular holes below the surface and the thermally refined steel roller with a fine axial tubular hole. The parameters m and C in Paris's law were obtained by using the relation between the crack propagation rate by the experiment and the stress intensity factor range by the calculation, and these parameters were finally expressed in terms of Vickers hardness. Using these parameters, the fatigue lives of the surface-hardened sintered rollers were estimated. The estimated fatigue lives mentioned above approximated to these experimental ones.
