Correlation between elastic and electric properties for cyclically loaded metals

Abstract

A new method of evaluation of the elastic property deterioration due to accumulated damage is suggested and experimentally verified. It is based on the explicit correlations between two groups of anisotropic properties – conductivity and elasticity, recently established for porous/microcracked materials with anistropic microstructures. An experimental study of fatigue has been done to verify the theoretical predictions. The electrical resistance and Young''s modulus are measured as functions of the number of loading cycles in the standard fatigue tests. The agreement between the theoretical predictions and the direct experimental data is better than 10% in all cases. The results allow one to use measurements of the electric resistance to estimate the damage accumulated in methal structures and the decrease of the elastic modulus.