Abstract
Peel-tension fatigue experiments were conducted for investigating on fatigue strength of mechanical press joints of SPCC steel sheet used in the field of the automobile industry. In addition, finite element method analysis on the peel-tension specimen was conducted using HyperMesh and ABAQUS softwares. The cold rolled mild steel was used to join the T-shaped peel-tension specimen with a button diameter of 5.4 mm and a punch diameter of 8.3 mm. The fatigue limit load amplitude was found to be 112.4 N at the number of cycles 106, indicating that the ratio of fatigue limit load to static peel-tension strength was about 8%. This value suggests that the mechanical press joint is highly vulnerable to peel-tension load rather than to tensile-shear load, considering that the ratio of fatigue limit load to static tensile-shear strength was about 43%. Fatigue failure mode was found to be interface-failure mode.