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Fatigue and Cycle Counting

Fatigue is a particularly complex topic, as there are several components to consider:
The SN curve, which defines the number of cycles of a given maximum (hot spot) stress the
material can withstand without breaking,
The Stress Concentration Factors (SCF) which define maximum stresses in terms of the
nominal ones, and
The duration which defines lifetime history of the environment to which the structure has been
exposed.
Normally the result of interest is a Cumulative Damage Ratio (CDR). This is simply a sum of ratio of
the fraction of the life used for all stress ranges. Sometimes, however, one wishes to view the loading
history independently of the SN curve. Thus, MOSES has the capability for counting either load
cycles or stress cycles sorted into bins. One can compute fatigue (or cycles) for BEAMs, PLATES,
tubular JOINTs and mooring lines and the details will vary with type. In general, one can compute
fatigue in either the time or frequency domains.
One is really interested in fatigue at all points in an element, but in reality we only consider it at a set
of "fatigue points": the ends, at points along a beam where the section changes, or at welds.
Generalized plates are special in that fatigue is computed at the centroid of each subelement.. To
really complicate these matters, some fatigue points have automatic methods to compute stress
concentration factor and others do not. In particular, MOSES has automated methods for computing
stress concentration factors for: tubular connections, tube/cone connections, and tubular joints. Stress
concentration factors must be manually associated with all other fatigue points.
In MOSES there are two ways to compute fatigue damage, on an element by element basis, or on a
tubular joint basis. The reason for the two methods is that for tubular joints, there is a body of
knowledge for automatically computing the SCFs and the associated hot spot stresses. For non tubular
joints, the information is much less extensive. Thus, for tubular members, one can do joint fatigue to
capture the damage at the ends, but one must do element (beam or generalized plate) fatigue to get
CDRs at intermediate locations. Also, element fatigue must be used to get the CDRs at the ends
elements which are not part of tubular joints.
As with stress concentration factors, an SN curve must be associated with each fatigue point. Again,
tubular joints are special in that one normally has only two choices for SN for a tubular joint and the
association of SN is different for doing JOINT fatigue than it is for doing BEAM fatigue.
The definition of the environmental history depends on whether a time domain or a frequency domain
simulation is being used. For frequency domain, a set of RAOs are computed and they are used along
with a scatter diagram of environments which act for a specified time. In the time domain, one time
domain simulation is performed per process. Load cases are defined at a reasonable number of times
during this simulation and the system solved for the time traces of the stresses. A Rainflow Counting
technique as outlined in ASTM E-1049, "Standard Practices for Cycle Counting in Fatigue Analysis"
is then used to compute the stress cycles and perhaps the cumulative damage. These results are
"scaled" by the ratio of duration time to simulation time. The results are summed over the selected
durations, so one can compute fatigue in both domains and over all lifetime situations.

http://bentley.ultramarine.com/hdesk/ref_man/fatigue.htm

6/3/2012

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If a duration environment is defined with more than one spectrum then MOSES provides two ways to
compute the "average period". The choice is governed with the -T_AVERAGE option of the
&PARAMETER command.
In the following we specifically discuss the role of the &REP_SELECT command, but any of the
options discussed for this command can be issued on the option which requests fatigue or cycle
information. In other words:
&REP_SELECT -SN X
JOINT_POST FATIGUE

produces the same result as

JOINT_POST FATIGUE -SN X

The same can be said of the BEAM_POST or PLATE_POST commands.

http://bentley.ultramarine.com/hdesk/ref_man/fatigue.htm

6/3/2012