Stress Variations Effect on the Accuracy of Slitting Method for Measuring Residual Stresses

To maintain the structural integrity of the engineering components, having an exact knowledge of residual stresses is important. Among all mechanical strain relief techniques to measure residual stresses, slitting is one of the youngest. This technique relies on the introduction of a narrow slot of increasing depth in a part containing residual stresses. Similar to other measurement techniques, slitting also employs simplifying assumptions. One of these assumptions is that the stress does not vary along the cut line. There are many sources of errors in the slitting method. However, the error caused by this assumption can be severe. In this research, residual stresses of quenched samples were measured experimentally using slitting technique. The results were then compared with those obtained from the finite element analyses. The cylindrical specimens were designed with different ratio of height to diameter to investigate the effect of stress variations in transverse direction along the cut plane. It was evident that the non-uniformity of stress can severely influence the residual stresses measurement. The experimental results confirmed the numerical findings.