Effect of the initial phase constitution in the low-cycle fatigue of NiTi wires

Vastly used due to their functional properties, NiTi shape memory alloys have mechanical properties and fatigue resistance known to be strongly affected by their thermomechanical state. In this work, the goal was to evaluate the fatigue resistance of near equiatomic Ni-rich NiTi heat treated wires in different tests temperature. In this manner, it was possible to evaluate the phase constitution effect on the fatigue resistance with a fixed thermomechanical condition. For that, a heat treatment at 500 °C for 30 min was performed in initially superelastic wires in an argon atmosphere. DSC tests were performed in order to obtain the transformation temperatures and there different fatigue test temperatures were chosen according to the phase stability ranges. Rotating-bending fatigue tests took place in proper equipment at 4% maximum strain, evaluating the properties of structures constituted by the R-phase, austenite and R-phase + austenite, in each selected test temperature. The results showed that the R-phase presents higher low-cycle fatigue resistance than austenite and a fatigue mechanism was proposed.