Ultrasonic fatigue testing under multiaxial loading conditions on a railway wheel

Ultrasonic fatigue testing is a relative recent fatigue methodology that uses resonant principles for the induction of stress cycles in a specific designed material specimen. This experimental method can apply very high cycle frequency, the most common frequency being 20 kHz, and was created with the main purpose of studying material fatigue life in the Very High Cycle Fatigue regime between 107 and 109 cycles with a higher performance of time and energy wise in comparison to conventional servo-hydraulic machines. In this study an improvement of an already built multiaxial ultrasonic fatigue machine in the Instituto Superior Técnico laboratories was carried out to specific designed specimens and afterwards a fatigue study was made for a material of a worn-out railway wheel. The particular design of the specimen was achieved by numerical and experimental analysis based on previous experiments and components. Thermographic imaging and the application of rosette strain gauges to the main throat of the specimens were conducted in order to validate the improved specimen design and to understand the real induced stresses on the specimen. Afterwards fatigue tests were conducted for several specimens for a wide range of stresses with a stress ratio R=-1 and an axial vs shear stress ratio of around 0.58. Results were analysed and fracture analysis was also carried out