Investigations into the cumulative fatigue life of an AISI 304L austenitic stainless steel used for pressure water reactors: Application of a double linear damage rule

• Multilevel fatigue tests were performed on a 304L stainless steel.
• Linear damage rule can give non conservative predictions of fatigue life.
• The role of the loading history is emphasized.
• The double linear damage rule seems to be promising as an additional approach.

In order to investigate cumulative damage in fatigue, a multi-level fatigue programme has been carried out on an austenitic stainless steel AISI 304L. All the tests have been performed under controlled strain-amplitude conditions, with several changes of levels up to rupture; values of strain-amplitude were included between 0.20% and 0.80%. The present experimental programme shows that applying a linear damage rule (LDR), also referred to as Palmgren–Miner’s rule, has been demonstrated to be unreliable in some cases. A loading sequence (loading history) effect is clearly shown for the two-level sequence tests; application of the LDR leads to residual fatigue-life overestimation for high-to-low loading (H–L) sequences whereas residual fatigue-life is underestimated for low-to-high loading (L–H) sequences. The multi-level and block tests, undertaken in this campaign, confirm also a possible non-verification of the LDR.Within this framework, the double linear damage rule (DLDR) has been tested. Its application would seem to be promising as an additional approach in certain situations. However, complex sequences and random fatigue tests are still needed to draw a conclusion, and to more clearly evaluate the conditions where use of the LDR would not be sufficient.