fatigue,ductile,brittle
fatigue,ductile,brittle
fatigue,ductile,brittle
Fatigue failures occur due to cyclic loading; the mechanism of failure is the initiation and
propagation of cracks. When a crack has reached a critical length, final fast fracture will occur by
either Brittle Fracture or Ductile Fracture. Fatigue fracture surfaces can usually be recognised
because they have one or more of the following features (see also the sketch below):
- a relatively flat, smooth region where fatigue crack growth took place, and a rougher,
fast fracture region.
- lines on the fracture surface, known as "beach marks" or "clam shell marks", which lie
parallel to the crack front, perpendicular to the direction of crack growth.
- corrosion (e.g. rusting) on the fatigue region of the fracture surface if the crack has been
exposed to a source of corrosion during growth. This can be increased by fretting action
if compressive stresses are involved.
- wear on the fatigue region surface if compressive stresses are involved, causing the two
surfaces of the crack to rub together.
The following two photographs show examples of fatigue failures, illustrating these features:
Microscopic Appearance: The SEM photograph below is typical of a fatigue fracture surface.
The failure is usually ductile in appearance (i.e. it does not show cleavage facets) but the scale of
the ductility is small - not sufficient to create dimples as in Ductile Failure.
This type of fracture surface is quite difficult to recognise; the main thing to remember is that it
does not show the features which are typical of fast fracture, i.e. Ductile Fracture or Brittle
Fracture. In some cases - usually very ductile metals such as aluminium, a pattern of parallel
lines known as "striations" occurs, marking the position of the crack front on successive load
cycles, as shown here:
The total width of this SEM picture is only 12µm (0.012mm). This specimen was cycled with
alternating blocks of 10 cycles at high stress followed by 10 cycles at low stress, creating groups
of striations with two different spacings.
If you see striations like this then you know it is definitely a fatigue failure, but in many
materials these striations don't occur.
BRITTLE FAILURE
Brittle fracture is the term given to static failures caused by crack propagation. Crack
propagation also figures in fatigue and creep failure, but brittle fracture occurs when a pre-
existing crack propagates very rapidly through the material. Such fractures release a lot of energy
and can be very loud, explosive and dangerous, as fragments of the material may be thrown long
distances. In many cases, especially if the micromechanism of cracking is cleavage (see below),
a macroscopic examination of the fracture surface may show lines (called "chevron marks")
which lead back to the failure origin. Here's an example (the arrow shows the origin):
A big difference between brittle fracture and ductile fracture is that in brittle fracture there is no
macroscopic deformation. So you can take the broken parts and put them back together again,
like making a jigsaw. You can't do this after a ductile fracture because the shape of the pieces has
changed. For example, compare the fracture of this bolt with the one shown above in the section
on Ductile Fracture:
Microscopic Appearance: The appearance of the fracture surface at high magnification depends
on the mechanism of crack propagation. This can be either ductile or brittle. Ductile crack
extension occurs if the crack grows by causing local plasticity ahead of the crack tip, which pulls
the material apart. Pores form and grow in the material just ahead of the crack. The crack grow
occurs by linking of these pores as shown in the sketch below.
This gives give a fracture surface identical to that described in the section above on Ductile
Fracture (see the SEM photos in that section).
Brittle crack extension, also called "cleavage", occurs by the splitting apart of planes in the
atomic lattice. Each grain cleaves like a gemstone, giving a perfectly flat surface, as shown in the
sketch below:
Because the cleavage plane for each grain will be at a different angle, the final fracture surface
will consist of a series of small flat planes, each corresponding to one grain. The following two
pictures show what this looks like at high magnification, in the SEM:
This photo shows cleavage fracture in a surface coating of Cadmium (applied to a steel
component to prevent corrosion and wear); the total thickness of the coating is about 95µm.
The two mechanisms of crack extension described above are both "transgranular", i.e. the crack
grows through each grain. If, alternatively, the crack propagates by travelling around the grains
(i.e. along the grain boundaries), then the mechanism is termed "intergranular". Intergranular
fractures can be either ductile or brittle; a brittle intergranular failure looks like this:
Here you see cleavage planes again as in the pictures above, but now you are looking at the
outsides of the grains. The existence of transgranular failure is often an indication that something
is wrong with the material (e.g. an incorrect heat treatment causing a brittle phase to form on the
grain boundaries). Most materials, in good condition, fail in the transgranular mode.
In a ductile intergranular failure you still see the outsides of the grains, but they have dimples on
them as shown here:
Ductile intergranular failures are quite rare - the only situation in which they commonly occur is
Creep. Also certain incorrect heat treatments applied to certain metal alloys can cause them to
fail in this way even at room temperature, but the phenomenon is rare.
The existence of the cleavage mode is an indication that the crack grew very easily in the
material, needing very little energy to propagate. This is often a clue to something wrong with
the material, such as an incorrect heat treatment or the use of a sub-standard material. Some
metals actually change from ductile fracture to brittle fracture if you lower the temperature.
However some materials are just inherently brittle and will always fail by this mode.
The terminology we use here is rather confusing, because we use the words 'ductile' and 'brittle'
to mean two different things. In classifying the different types of failure we talk about Brittle
Fracture (meaning fracture due to crack growth) and Ductile Fracture (sometimes called 'ductile
failure') meaning fracture due to the yield strength being exceeded. But within the category of
Brittle Fracture we also talk about cracks propagating by either ductile or brittle mechanisms, as
you see above. Sorry for the confusion - that's just the way it is!
DUCTILE FAILURE
A failure is termed "ductile" if it occurs by plastic deformation, i.e. if the yield strength of the
material is exceeded. This causes a permanent change in shape of the part, which becomes
apparent if one attempts to reassemble broken components. Tensile stress causes necking,
reducing the cross section of the part, as shown dramatically in this failed bolt:
Shear stress causes deformation of the type shown below in this sketch of a failed rivet:
Some plastic deformation also occurs in other types of failure: for example fatigue failure always
involves some plasticity, and brittle fracture may be preceded by plastic strain. However, in these
cases the amount of plasticity is small: ductile fracture is characterised by gross plasticity which
leads to an obvious change in shape of the component.
Microscopic Appearance: Below are two photos taken using a scanning electron microscope
(SEM) showing the appearance of ductile fracture surfaces at high magnification. They have a
distinctive 'dimpled' appearance, the surface being covered with small dimples or craters. These
dimples result from the fracture of spherical pores which open up due to plastic deformation (see
more about this under Brittle Fracture below). The dimples may contain inclusions and other
small particles from which the pores nucleated.
Above: SEM photograph of part of a fracture surface, at high magnification. The total width of
this picture is about 50µm (0.05mm)
SEM photograph of another ductile fracture surface. The dotted line (bottom left) shows the
scale (in this case 10µm).