Considerations on the Approach of Rolling Contact Fatigue Assuming Multiaxial States of Stress

Rolling contact fatigue appears in many mechanical elements, in the presence of variable local loadings. During the last years an increasing attention has been awarded macroscopic and mesoscopic analysis of repetitive rolling contact, taking into consideration local triaxial states of stress. Given the above, the authors analyze a fatigue criterion based on the stress state invariants, which is validated using original results as well as existing data from the literature. The criterion is applied to the case of linear contact with friction, which has analytical solutions for the elastic state of stress on the rolling surface and in the adjacent zone. A durability calculation method is presented for the case of rolling contact, based on the ratio between the maximum and experimentally obtained critical (limit) value of a damage parameter