Fatigue fracture mechanism of AZ31B magnesium alloy and its welded joint

Fatigue test was carried out on AZ31B magnesium alloy. Under 2×106 cycle times, the fatigue strengths of base metal (BM), butt joint (BJ), transverse cross joint (TJ), lateral connection joint (LJ) are 66.72, 39.00, 24.38 and 24.40 MPa, respectively. The crack propagation behavior of the alloy was analyzed by optical microscopy. The AZ31B magnesium alloy base metal has a smooth crack propagation macroscopic path. However, the microscopic path is twisted and some cracks have two forks, and the crack propagation is transgranular. The crack initiates in the weld toe and the crack propagates along the HAZ for the BJ and TJ; for the LJ crack initiates in the fillet weld leg. The fatigue fracture mechanisms were analyzed by SEM. The fatigue fracture surface consists of quasi-cleavage patterns or cleavage step and a brittle fracture occurs. Numerous secondary cracks are observed; some fatigue striations exist in butt joint and its size is about 5 μm.