Using acoustic emission to understand fatigue crack growth within a single load cycle

Current methods for prediction of fatigue crack growth are based on empirical correlations which do not take the crack growth behaviour within a single cycle into account. To improve these prediction methods, more understanding of the physical mechanisms of crack growth is required. In this research the acoustic emission technique was used to investigate the crack growth behaviour during a single fatigue cycle. It was found that crack growth can potentially occur both during loading and unloading, but only while the strain energy release rate is above a crack growth (CG) threshold value. The results suggest this CG threshold value is the same in both quasi-static and fatigue loading. Further work is necessary to fully understand the link between the received acoustic emission signals and the actual crack growth processes. Nevertheless, the paper shows the potential of acoustic emission to provide more insight into the physics of crack growth.