A theoretical and experimental procedure for predicting the fretting fatigue strength of complete contacts

An asymptotic approach to the complete fretting contact problem is presented, with a view to elucidating the crack nucleation process. It is suggested that the characteristic stress state at the edge of the prototypical contact can be matched to a test having the same local contact angle and coefficient of friction. A generalized stress intensity factor is then defined, to scale both fields, hence matching the magnitudes of the stress state. Experimental investigations of this approach has prompted the need for some modifications to our original test apparatus, in order to accommodate complete contacts, and these are briefly outlined. Last, the limitations of this approach are discussed.