A novel frequency domain method for predicting fatigue crack growth under wide band random loading

This work deals with the evaluation of the fatigue crack growth rate of structural components subjected to uniaxial Gaussian stationary wide band random loading. In detail, a new frequency domain method that allows the user to estimate the expected crack growth rate directly from the PSD data is proposed. Using a stochastic mean function properly, introduced and described by simple closed form relationships implemented by systematic numerical simulations of a high number of wide band random processes, the proposed method permits to avoid the onerous time domain simulations and provides in general crack growth rate predictions in a good accordance with the so-called time domain method. Practical applications, carried out by considering various PSDs reported in the literature, have corroborated the accuracy of the proposed method. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.