The Analysis of Choice Influence in Fatigue Failure Criteria on Integrity Assessment of Wagon Structure

Original scientific paper This paper presents the S-N approach to fatigue failure analysis of welded joints that integrates well with finite element modelling. Goodman's criterion and fatigue criterion based on the equivalent stress range were used for the analysis of the fatigue failure. Goodman's criterion and fatigue criterion based on the equivalent stress range, for determining fatigue safety factor are implemented in the software package for finite element analysis PAK. Numerical calculation of fatigue safety factor was determined to assess the integrity of wagon structure parts according to the most commonly used European standards for wagon analysis. According to failure safety factors obtained by Goodman's criterion and fatigue criterion based on the equivalent stress range it should be noticed that both methods give good results. Both criteria give us adequate identification causes of cracking on the underframe of wagon for containers transportation. The obtained results and their well matching prove reliability of both fatigue failure criteria and that they can be used for integrity assessment of wagon structure parts.