Consideration for a Proper Stress Definition in Fatigue Analysis of Welded Structures

At present, fatigue design of welded structures is primarily based on nominal stress or hot spot stress approach with a series of classified weld S-N curves. However, these methods are known to possess drawbacks, such as difficulty associated with defining proper nominal stress and the finite element sue sensitivity etc. Recently, a mesh-size insensitive structural stress definition is proposed by Battelle that gives a stress state at weld toe with relatively large mesh size. The structural stress definition is based on the elementary structural mechanics theory and provides an effective measure of a stress state in front of weld toe. As an experimental validation of the structural stress method in obtaining the fatigue strength of weldments, a series of experiment is carried out for various sizes of weldments. Based on the result from this study, it is expected to develop a more precise fatigue strength evaluation technique and to save time period required in the fatigue design of ship and offshore structures.