• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.58-64
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• 2001

The initiation and propagation lives of fatigue crack were studied for spot weldments composed of cold rolled steel plates(SPC$\times$SPC) and galvanized steel plates(GA$\times$GA) using DC potential drop method(DCPDM). Through the various test results, it was known that the fatigue crack initiation and propagation behaviors in all specimens could be definitely detected by DCPDM. The fatigue crack initiation life( $N_{i}$) detected by DCPDM in SPC$\times$SPC and GA$\times$GA spot weldments increased as the welding current and the nugget diameter( $N_{d}$) increased. The fatigue crack propagation life($\Delta$ $N_{f-i}$) declined as the difference of $N_{i}$ and the fatigue fracture life( $N_{f}$) also increased according to the decrease of fatigue load, $\Delta$P and the increase of nugget diameter. In the same spot weldments, the increase of nugget diameter came to increase fatigue crack propagation life owing to a decrease of stress concentration in front of nugget, especially the increasing extent for GA$\times$GA spot weldment was very high. In the welding current 6kA, $N_{f}$ for GA$\times$GA spot weldment decreased more than that of SPC$\times$SPC specimen due to zinc layer coated in steel plate and undersized nugget diameter. On the other hand, in 8kA and 10kA, the GA$\times$GA spot weldment showed higher $N_{f}$ in spite of lower $N_{i}$, than that of SPC$\times$SPC specimen except 3,000N fatigue load.ue load. load.d.