Deriving a Probabilistic Model for Fatigue Life Based on Physical Failure Mechanism

A probabilistic model for fatigue life of a structural component is derived when the component is in a variable-amplitude loading environment. The physical mechanism which governs fatigue failure is used to model the fatigue life. Especially, the judgement of rotational symmetry in the-stress-intensity-factors results in the probability distribution for fatigue life. The probability distribution is related to the familiar truncated Gaussian distribution, which has a single parameter with a direct physical meaning.