Abstract
This study aims to investigate the influence of bevel angles on the fatigue life of V-groove butt-welded joints with back-plates made by SM490A steel material, generally used for excavators, because changes in the geometry, material and surface properties of welded regions affect the fatigue life of welded structures. Butt type test specimens were prepared by the $CO_2$ welding of rolled steel plates (SM50A steel) with a thickness of 13.5 mm at a welding speed of 30 cm/min and these Butt type test specimens had two different groove angles, which are $40^{\circ}$ (A type) and $30^{\circ}$ (B type). In order to investigate differences in fatigue life between two types, 4-point bending fatigue tests were conducted with a stress ratio of R=0.1 under the cyclic loading environment at a frequency of 5 Hz at room temperature. The fatigue life of A type specimens was approximately 7% higher than that of B type specimens. The stress concentration factors calculated by finite element analysis were 2.16 for A type and 2.25 for B type, whose difference was caused by the influence of the back-plates of butt-welded structures. The current results could provide important guidelines to determine the V-groove angle of butt-welded joints with a satisfactory fatigue life, although under severe operating conditions.