P.

Dong
Center for Welded Structures Research, Battelle, Columbus, OH 43016-2693 e-mail: dongp@battelle.org

A Robust Structural Stress Method for Fatigue Analysis of Offshore/Marine Structures

Recent rapid advances in developing mesh-insensitive structural stress methods are summarized in this paper. The new structural stress methods have been demonstrated to be effective in reliably calculating structural stresses that can be correlated with fatigue behavior from simple weld details to complex structures. As a result, a master SN curve approach has been developed and validated by a large amount of weld SN data in the literature. The applications of the present structural stress methods in a number of joint types in offshore/marine structures will be illustrated in this paper. The implications on future applications in drastically simplifying fatigue design and evaluation for offshore/ marine structures will also be discussed, particularly for using very coarse nite element mesh designs in ship structures. DOI: 10.1115/1.1854698

Introduction
Hot spot stress based fatigue design approach has been used for many years in offshore tubular structures. Such an approach has received an increasing attention for applications in welded plate joints such as those in ship structures, since the traditional weld classication approach requires the determination of nominal stresses for a given joint geometry and loading mode, both of which can be difcult to dene in realistic structures. The representative research efforts along this line can be found in 1 by Fricke 1 for a recent evaluation of the conventional hot spot stress approach and in 2 by Dong et al. for introducing a new approach in both the structural stress denition and numerical procedures. The new structural stress procedure presented by Dong et al. 2 and subsequently by Dong et al. 3 6 and independently validated by Healy 7 has demonstrated its promise in a consistent characterization of stress concentration effects at weld toe while achieving a good mesh-size and element-type insensitivity for continuous welds. A continuous weld here refers to a line formed by weld toe nodes along the weld direction, which can be approximately described as a continuous curve in a shell or plate element model. A simple example of this type welds is a circumferential girth weld. A full-width edge-to-edge llet weld in a plate is also considered as a continuous weld since the weld ends in this case, although not at the same position, do not introduce stress concentrations. On the other hand, an intermittent weld is not a continuous weld. A more detailed illustration will be given in later sections. In dealing with such noncontinuous welds, a virtual node method was recently discussed by Dong et al. 4,6 as an extension of the structural stress procedures described in 2 . The additional advantage of the virtual node method is that it is particularly suited for fatigue screening purposes in earlier stage of fatigue evaluation of ship structures, since weld representations are often not considered in coarse nite element models. Along this line, some recent developments in the alternative structural stress methods are presented in this paper. Their applications in using very coarse FE models, such as those typically used in fatigue screening at an early design stage will be demonstrated. The potential for combining both screening and local detailed fatigue design and analysis in one single step will be examined, at least for most of weld details.
Contributed by the OOAE Division for publication in the JOURNAL OF OFFSHORE MECHANICS AND ARCTIC ENGINEERING. Manuscript received March 21, 2004; nal revision, May 23, 2004. Review conducted by: M. Toyoda.

The New Structural Stress Method

The basic concept was given in Dong et al. 2 and some additional variations of the numerical procedures for using either solid or shell element models was recently discussed by Dong et al. 3 6 . The essence of the method was based on the following considerations for fatigue evaluations of welded joints: a. It was postulated that stress concentration at a fatigue prone location, such as a weld toe as shown in Fig. 1 a , can be represented by an equilibrium-equivalent simple stress state as shown in Fig. 1 b and self-equilibrium stress state as shown in Fig. 1 c . The former describes a stress state corresponding to an equivalent far eld stress state in fracture mechanics context 4,6 , or simply, a generalized nominal stress state at the same location, while the latter can be estimated by introducing a characteristic depth t 1 as shown in Fig. 1 dashed lines , as discussed in detail in 8; b. Within the context of displacement-based nite element methods, the most accurate solution quantities are balanced nodal forces and nodal moments if using shell or plate element models , on which equilibrium conditions are directly enforced at all nodal positions and element wise. Therefore, to ensure a reasonable mesh-size insensitivity at structural discontinuities such as at weld toe in weld joints, the nodal forces and nodal moments can be directly used to extract the structural stresses at location of concern. Due to the underlying equilibrium considerations, the structural stress calculation procedures have been demonstrated to be rather insensitive to local mesh renements once an overall geometry is properly modeled 4,6 and as long as a curve representing weld toe is adequately continuous along weld direction at the weld toe. For convenience of further reference, we designate this line as weld toe line. For situations when a weld toe line may take, say a 90 deg turn at a nodal position from one element to another, the continuous weld toe line assumption is obviously violated. Such situations often occur as a result of simplied representations of welded joints in plate structures 1 . In treating such discontinuous welds, Dong et al. 4 6 introduced a virtual node method that proves to be effective if certain rules on the element sizes are followed. Those limitations can be dropped in the numerical procedures discussed in this paper by generalizing the virtual node method for arbitrarily sized mesh design. In what follows, numerical implementations for both continuous and discontinuous weld lines are discussed. A series of calculation examples are also demonstrated. Transactions of the ASME Copyright 2005 by ASME

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Fig. 1 Through-thickness structural stresses denition: a Local stresses from FE model; b structural stress or far-eld stress; c self-equilibrating stress and structural stress based estimation with respect to t 1 dashed lines

Fig. 2 Robust structural stress calculation procedures for curved weld with distorted mesh using shellplate element models

nodal forces or moments to line forces and moments of interest 4,6 in a work equivalent sense. Numerical Procedures. For a continuous weld illustrated in Fig. 2, the elements e.g., E1, E2, . . . along the weld toe are used for extracting nodal forces from a typical nite element solution in the global coordinate system (x,y,z). The rotation of the nodal force vector along the weld onto the local coordinate system (x ,y ,z ) is done as discussed in earlier publications 2 6 for each element with x along the weld toe line. For linear shell/plate elements, the work-equivalent or the work done by the nodal forces over the nodal displacements is the same as that by line forces over the same nodal displacements based formulation for line forces can be calculated from a system of linear equations in the matrix form, for linear elements:

Continuous Welds. As discussed recently in 2 8 , the new structural stress procedures can be most conveniently implemented in shell/plate element models since balanced nodal forces and moments at element level are directly available along a three dimensional weld line along a weld toe. For general applications, in addition to mesh-size, often distorted element shapes may be present in modeling an actual structure or stress gradients are severe along the weld. Under such circumstances, a system of simultaneous equations can be formulated to relate the balanced

l1 3 F1 F2 F3 ] ] Fn l1 6 0 0 ] 0

l1 6 l1 l2 3 l2 6 0

0 l2 6 l2 l3 3

0 0 l3 6 ln

0 0 0 0

ln 3

ln 1 6 ln 1 3

f1 f2 f3 ] ] fn

(1)

ln 1 6

In the above equation, f 1 , f 2 , . . . , f n are line forces along y . In the matrix on the left hand of Eq. 1 , l i (i 1,2, . . . ,n 1) represents the element edge length projected onto the weld toe line from ith element The corresponding line moments can be calculated in an identical manner by replacing balanced nodal forces F 1 , F 2 , . . . ,F n in local y direction with balanced nodal moments M 1 , M 2 , . . . ,M n with respect to x in Eq 1 above. Note that nodal force F i in Eq. 1 represents the summation of the nodal forces at node i from the adjoining weld toe elements situated on the positive side of y axis, as shown in Fig. 2. The linear system of equations described in Eq. 1 can be solved simultaneously to obtain the line forces for all nodes along the line conJournal of Offshore Mechanics and Arctic Engineering

necting all weld toe nodes. Then, the structural stress shown in Fig. 1 b at each node along the weld such as weld toe can be calculated as:
s m b

fy t

6m x t2

(2)

Fo parabolic plate or shell elements, Eq. 1 can be formulated in an identical manner with the relationships provided in 6,7 . Calculation Examples. Fig. 3 summarizes the application of the present calculation procedures for a single cover plate llet weld. Fig. 3 a shows the 3D shell element model assuming a quarter symmetry. The llet weld is represented by a row of inFEBRUARY 2005, Vol. 127 69

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Fig. 3 Comparison of the structural stress results using the proposed method for a cover plate llet weld: a Shell element model, b A 2D cross-section showing weld representation; c Comparison of structural stress results at weld toe with different element sizes and types

Fig. 4 Validation of mesh-size insensitivity in the structural stress calculations using the present procedures for a doubling-plate llet joint investigated by Fricke 1

clined plate elements, as shown in detail in Fig. 3 b . The normalized structural stress results obtained at weld toe by using Eqs. 1 and 2 are summarized in Fig. 3 c . For the shell element models, both 8-node parabolic elements with reduced integration and 4-node linear elements with full integrations were used for three mesh sizes of 0.5t, 1t, and 2t. For comparison purposes, the results obtained using a 3D solid parabolic elements with reduced integration were also shown in Fig. 3 c . It can be seen that the structural stress based SCF at the weld toe of the mid-weld length remains essentially the same, regardless of element sizes, element types and integration orders used. A doubling-plate llet weld was examined by Fricke 1 for applications of extrapolation-based hot spot stress procedures for ship details. A signicant variation 1.4 1.7 in normalized hot spot stresses under unit remote stress loading was reported by Fricke 1 , based on an international round-robin effort of nite element hot spot stress analyses, in which various nite element types and weld representation procedures were considered. It should be noted that in all cases reported 1 , the element sizes at weld toe is within typical extrapolation requirements, i.e., less than 1t for parabolic elements or 0.5t for linear elements. As shown in Figs. 4 a and 4 b , three shell element models were used in this investigation for the same doubling plate. The weld geometry was represented by a row of 45 deg inclined shell elements connecting with both base plate and the 50 mm diameter padding plate, recognizing that the actual llet weld height is less than the thickness of the padding plate 1 . The structural stresses along the llet weld toe for the circular weld were solved simultaneously according Eqs. 1 and 2 for three different mesh designs shown in Fig. 4 b . The corresponding structural stress distributions along the weld toe are summarized in Fig. 4 c . It can be seen that both the distributions and peak structural stresses calculated are essentially mesh-size insensitive. A tubular T-joint according to a recent round robin study on fracture assessment 9 is shown in Fig. 5 a , where a detailed strain gauge measurements were also collected for deriving hot 70 Vol. 127, FEBRUARY 2005

spot stress based stress concentration at the saddle positions as shown. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the present structural stress procedures, four shell element models with drastically different element sizes near the tube-to-tube weld are shown in Fig. 5 b , varying approximately from 0.25t 0.25t, 0.5t 0.5t, 1t 1t, to 2t 2t. Note that the weld was not modeled at the tubeto-tube intersection in simplifying mesh generation efforts in the present mesh-sensitivity study. In various earlier studies on tubular joints, the presence of welds is often ignored, such as those reported by Connolly et al. 11 . Relevant issues associated with such approximations and effects on both hot spot extrapolation and the current structural stress procedures can be found in a recent paper by Dong and Hong 10 . Figure 5 c summarizes the structural stresses along the weld toe on the chord side obtained from the four shell models shown in Fig. 5 b . Since the structural stresses along the weld possess a quarter symmetry, Fig. 5 c shows only the results for a quarter of the weld length measured from the saddle point shown in Fig. 5 b . The maximum structural stress concentration occurs at the saddle position. Within the angular span of 90 deg along the 3D curved weld from saddle to crown positions, the 2t 2t mesh represents the weld line with only three nodal positions or about two and half elements as shown by the triangle symbols in Fig. 5 c . Therefore, the difference in the structural stress calculations from the 2t 2t mesh is mainly due to the overall geometric changes at the weld line tube to tube intersection resulted from the large linear element sizes used. However, the structural stress based SCF at the saddle position is still within about 5% of the ne mesh case (0.25t 0.25t). If excluding the 2t 2t mesh, the SCF variations in the other three models are all within the 2% of each other. Further discussions on this tubular joint and validations by experimental measurements are given in 10 . Discontinuous Welds and Weld End Effects. In previous discussions, two assumptions are implied in formulating the system of equations described in Eq. 1 : a. It is assumed that a weld toe line along the weld direction is reasonably continuous as shown in Fig. 2. In other words, if one Transactions of the ASME

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Fig. 6 Comparison of FEA surface stress distributions predicted by various modeling procedures and extrapolation based hot stress SCF predicted at the weld toe on attachment plate 1

weld ends to signicant in-plane stress concentration. An example of these is taken from Fricke 1 and Kim et al. 12 is shown in Fig. 6. Fatigue failure at weld toe corresponding to the top weld end on the attachment plate side was investigated in detail 12 at the weld ends. Generalized Virtual Node Method. In dealing with such weld end or sharp weld corner effects along weld toe , a simple virtual node method can be used in the context of the present structural stress procedures, as demonstrated by Dong et al. 4 at an individual element level at weld ends, when the element size at the weld is relatively large. The virtual node method has been implemented in this investigation by considering arbitrary element sizes at the weld toe in the following manner. As shown in Fig. 7, two reference length parameters from a weld end are designated as l 1 and l, as shown. The parameter l 1 distance from the weld end to the virtual node position in Fig. 7 can be related to a fatigue failure criterion for a crack propagating along the weld toe from the weld end point. This is often the case for edge details such as that used by Kim et al. 12 , in which a nite crack depth of 20 mm or l 1 20 mm) was used for a total ligament length of 150 mm. The parameter l serves as an integration interval in enforcing equilibrium conditions for edge tractions along the weld toe line from weld end to a distance measured by l. As discussed in Dong et al. 4,6 , a condition of l 2l 1 may be imposed by considering the discontinuity effects on the overall structural stress calculations along an entire weld line. With this procedure, at rst, the edge tractions line force and line moments are calculated in the same way as before using Eq. 1 . The linear form of the local tractions along l are then calculated based on the

Fig. 5 Structural stress calculations for a tubular T joint used by Zerbst et al. 9: a T -joint geometry and loading conditions; b Four FE models with different element sizes; c Comparison of the current structural stress results along weld toe at chord

travels along the weld, the change of the direction in y is not signicant from one element to another. This assumption is needed particularly for linear elements since the local x -y system at a node is determined based on the vector summation of the two normal vectors of the two adjacent element edges in Eq. 1 . If the weld toe line direction changes signicantly at a node, such a combined normal vector procedure may fail to represent an actual weld line, without adequate mesh renements. The previous numerical examples presented should provide some indications on the limit of this assumption in practice. The structural stress results for the doubling plate llet weld in Fig. 4 showed that the continuous weld assumptions are still valid even with Mesh 3. In the tubular T joint case with 2t 2t mesh, the 3D weld toe curve is represented in a piece-wise linear manner by three and half nodes spanning from the saddle to crown positions. The results suggest that the continuous weld line assumption may be violated upon further increase in element sizes, resulting in a rapid increase in structural stress variations. b. It is assumed that the two weld ends i.e., start and stop positions are either closed such as the tubular T-joint in Fig. 5, or not subjected to severe stress concentrations such as the cover plate llet weld in Fig. 3, in which, the two weld ends are located along the free edges without any geometric discontinuities in x -y plane see Fig. 2 . However, intermittent welds must be considered in general application of the present procedures. Often, even if dealing with continuous welds in realistic structures, articial sharp corners can often be introduced in simplifying modeling efforts in complex structures, as discussed by Dong et al. 4 . Some edge details in ship structures once represented by shell/plate element models such as type b as discussed by Fricke 1 tend to subject their Journal of Offshore Mechanics and Arctic Engineering

Fig. 7 Generalized procedure for implementing virtual node method E1, E2, . . . , represent element numbers at weld toe

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Fig. 8 Mesh-size insensitivity demonstration for an edge detail investigated in 1,12: a FE models with drastically different element sizes; b comparison of structural stress distributions along weld toe on attachment plate Fig. 9 Structural stress results using virtual node methoda RHS T-Joint

solutions from Eq. 1 and is expressed in the form of equivalent nodal forces F 1 and F 2 and nodal moments . Then, the equilibrium-equivalent line force at the weld end Position 1 can be estimated as discussed in 4 : f1 1 F l l l l1 1 1 F2 l1 l (3)

The corresponding line moment at the same position can be calculated in the same manner. The new line forces and moments considering weld end effects can be obtained by re-solving Eq. 1 with the line force and moments at Position 1 in Fig. 7 as constraints. The corresponding structural stresses at each nodal position along the entire weld line are obtained through Eq. 2 as before. Calculation Examples. In the rst calculation example, an I-beam to plate llet weld shown in Fig. 6 from Fricke 1 and Kim et al. 12 is analyzed using the new structural stress procedures discussed in the above. In Eq. 3 , l 1 t was assumed in this example, with t being the thickness of the attachment plate with t 10 mm 1,12 . Four drastically different element sizes from 0.5t 0.5t all the way to 4t 4t are used in the mesh designs as shown in Fig. 8 a . With the above virtual node procedure, the structural stress distributions normalized by the nominal bending stress calculated along the weld toe on the attachment plate side are shown in Fig. 8 b . It can be seen that the variation in the structural stress calculated at the weld end positions is within about 1% for all four cases. Note that in all four models shown in Fig. 8 a , the actual weld geometry is not modeled for simplicity. As the element sizes change at the beam to attachment intersec72 Vol. 127, FEBRUARY 2005

tion, the geometric representation remains the same even if 4t 4t mesh is used. This is not the case for the tubular T-joint shown in Fig. 5 discussed earlier, due to the presence of the 3D curvature at the tube to tube intersection. A rectangular hollow section T-joint with intermittent welds is shown in Fig. 9. For demonstration purposes, one weld segment is analyzed here, as indicated by the arrow in Fig. 9 a . The structural stress results along the weld toe on the chord side are summarized in Fig. 9 b for FE meshes with element sizes near weld toe of 0.5t 0.5t, 1t 1t, and 1.5t 1.5t, respectively. Again, the difference in structural stresses calculated is not noticeable in Fig. 9 b among three different meshes.

Discussions
In seeking an effective FE based stress parameter for correlating fatigue behavior of welded joints, the two fundamental requirements must be met: a. The rst requirement can be classied as the necessary conditions in that the stress concentration effects at weld joints must be consistently captured in the stress calculations from FE models. In this regard, the stresses calculated at a fatigue prone location such as at weld toe should show a reasonable mesh-size and element type insensitivity. The various examples discussed in this paper should demonstrate the effectiveness of the present method. b. The other can be classied as the sufcient conditions. It should be noted that in extrapolation based procedures, hot spot Transactions of the ASME

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The effectiveness of the Eq. 4 is demonstrated in Fig. 10 by using a large amount of existing S-N data from literature see 6 for detailed discussions . Figure 10 a shows the typical nominal stress range versus N loglog plot showing a huge scatter band, as expected. This is because the data are from many joint types e.g., cruciform llet, butt girth weld, etc. with drastically different thicknesses varying from 4 to 104 mm, and different loading modes varying from pure remote tension to pure bending. Once the equivalent structural stress parameter in Eq. 4 is used, as shown in Fig. 10 b . All the data essentially fall into a narrow band without resorting any additional empirical parameter. As discussed by Dong et al. 6 , a line through this data band is characterized as the master SN curve. The effectiveness of Eq. 4 can be attributed to the fact that the equivalent structural stress parameter provides a single parameter description of fatigue damage process in weldments as a function of stress concentration state ( s ), plate thickness (t),, and loading mode (r), widely observed experimentally in the literature.

Conclusions
A robust structural stress procedure is presented in this paper for fatigue design and evaluation of welded joints. It is particularly suited for ship structures where the use of very coarse nite element meshes can be highly desirable, particularly at an early design and screening stage. Due to its clear denition and sound mechanics basis, the present structural stress procedure can be readily automated for dealing with actual complex ship structures. In addition, the structural stress procedure is capable of providing a consistent stress concentration characterization for welded joints irrespective of element types used such as shell elements versus solid elements, linear versus parabolic, and under various loading conditions. The validity of the structural stress denition and calculation procedures have been proven by its ability to effectively consolidate a large amount of published weld fatigue SN data from various industries into a narrow band. In doing so, a proper separation of the bending and membrane components from a given structural stress state is fundamental to the effectiveness of the equivalent structural stress parameter as a fatigue driving force for welded joints. Consequently, a master SN curve can be established for all joints analyzed thus far, without using any empirical parameter.

Fig. 10 Correlation of a large amount of existing weld S-N data from literature 6 using the proposed equivalent structural stress parameter in Eq. 4: a Nominal stress range versus N; b Equivalent structural stress range versus N

stresses can be consistently calculated from those FE meshes that provide convergent surface stress solutions at the extrapolation positions 7 . However, as demonstrated in the companion report 10 , such hot spot stresses may not be adequate in differentiating some of the well-known stress concentration characteristics and their important effects on fatigue behavior. Therefore, the sufcient conditions, in addition to mesh-size sensitivity, can be stated as: the calculated stress parameter should be able to correlate fatigue SN data collected from drastically different joint types and loading modes, which are currently categorized by a large number of parallel SN curves in the literature and Codes and Standards 13 . As reported by the author and co-workers recently in a number of previous publications 2 6 , the sufcient conditions stated above are met by the present structural stress procedures. A large amount of existing weld SN data from many joint types, drastically different thickness and loading mode has been analyzed and correlated by introducing an equivalent structural stress range parameter as: Ss
s

Acknowledgment
The author appreciates the encouragement of the publication of this work by the Battelle Structural Stress JIP participants.

References
1 Fricke W., 2001, Recommended Hot-Spot Analysis Procedure for Structural Details of FPSOs and Ships Based on Round-Robin FE Analysis, ISOPE Proceedings, Stavanger, Norway, June. 2 Dong, P., Hong, J. K., Cao, Z., 2000, A Mesh-Insensitive Structural Stress Procedure for Fatigue Evaluation of Welded Structures, International Institute of Welding, IIW Doc. XIII-1902-01/XV-1089-01, July. 3 Dong, P., 2001, A Structural Stress Denition and Numerical Implementation for Fatigue Evaluation of Welded Joints, Int. J. Fatigue, 2310, pp. 865 876. 4 Dong, P. and Hong, J. K., 2002, A Structural Stress Based Master S-N Curve Approach for Welded Joints, 55th International Institute of Welding IIW Annual Assembly, Document No. IIW Doc. XIII-1930-02/XV-1119-02, Copenhagen, Denmark, June 2327. 5 Dong, P., Hong, J. K, Osage, D., and Prager, M., Assessment of ASMEs FSRF Rules for Pipe and Vessel Welds Using A New Structural Stress Method, Welding In the World, Vol. 47, No. 1/2, 2003, pp. 31 43. 6 Dong, P., Hong, J. K., Osage, D., Prager, M., 2002, Master S-N Curve Method for Fatigue Evaluation of Welded Components, WRC Bulletin, No. 474, August. 7 Healy, B, A Case Study Comparison of Surface Extrapolation and Baltelle Structural Stress Methodologies, Paper No. OMAE 2004-51228, Proceedings of the 23rd OMAE International Conference, Vancouver, Canada, June 2004. 8 Dong, P., Hong, J. K., and Cao, Z., 2003, Stress and Stress Intensities at Notches: Anomalous Short Crack Growth Revisited, Int. J. Fatigue 25, pp. 811 825. 9 Zerbst, U., Heerens, J., and Schwalbe, K.-H., 2002, The fracture behavior of a welded tubular jointan ESIS TC1.3 round-robin on failure assessment

2 m /2m

I r

1/m

(4)

by additional fracture mechanics considerations 3 6 . In Eq. 4 , s represents the structural stress range calculated using the present procedure, I(r) is a dimensionless parameter derived by fracture mechanics considerations, and m is crack propagation exponent in conventional Paris law, taking on a value of about 3.6 4 6,8 . The parameter r measures the bending content of a structural stress state, as r b /( m b ). Due to limitation in space here, interested readers should consult earlier publications 4 6,8 for details. Journal of Offshore Mechanics and Arctic Engineering

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methods Part I: experimental data base and brief summary of the results, Eng. Fract. Mech., 69, pp. 10931100. 10 Dong, P. and Hong, J. K., 2002, Analysis of Hot Spot Stress and Alternative Structural Stress Methods, Paper No. OMAE 2003-37315, Proceedings of the 22nd OMAE International Conference, June 8 13, Cancun, Mexico. 11 Connolly, M. P., Helier, A. K., and Sutomo, J., 1990, A parametric study of the ratio of bending to membrane stress in tubular Y- and T-joints, Int. J. Fatigue, 12, No. 1, pp. 311.

12 Kim, W. S., Kim, D. H., Lee, S. G., and Lee, Y. K., Fatigue strength of load-carrying box llet weldment in ship structures, Proc. of 8th International Symposium on Practical Design of Ships and Other Floating Structures PRADS 2001 , Shanghai, China. 13 Hobbacher, A., Fatigue Design of Welded Joints and Components, Recommendations of IIW Joint Working Group XIII-XV, Abington Publishing, Abington, Cambridge, 1996.

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