A posteriori processing for estimation of low cycle fatigue failure in SESMA wires

Super elastic shape memory alloys (SESMA) are promising materials for damping applications due to their inherent hysteresis associated solid-solid reversible phase transformations. These transformations induce a large recoverable strain in the material. In most of the applications, SMA is used in the form of thin wires subjected to low cycle fatigue. This paper presents the experimental investigations on low cycle fatigue behavior of the SESMA thin wires subjected to various loading conditions. An attempt is also made to estimate the low cycle fatigue life of SESMA. The dissipated energy during the transformation is used as the key parameter to estimate the life cycles. From the results it can be seen that the estimation of the life cycles are well in agreement with the experimental fatigue life of the SESMA samples.