Fatigue lifespan of a fillet welded joint - Hybrid approach to obtain the S-N curve with a reduced number of tests

Abstract This paper introduces a hybrid approach for obtaining S-N curves with reduced number of tests associated to statistically simulated data. In order to validate the proposal, two validation process were developed. One using a methodology to generate S-N curves based on Monte Carlo simulations and other using actual data according Zhao et al. (1998), allowing to compare the hybrid approach with the experimental curve S-N obtained with high replication. In both validation process, a good accuracy was verified. Subsequently, the fatigue analysis of a fillet welded joint was carried out using finite element analysis to evaluate the cumulative damage and fatigue life, enabling comparison between the proposed method and standard NBR 8800 (2008). The results obtained with the proposed methodology allowed more accuracy results and less conservative than standard for the same weld detail class, both for fatigue life and for cumulative fatigue damage evaluations.