High and Low Cycle Fatigue Behavior of Linear Friction Welded Ti-6Al-4V

Linear friction welded Ti-6Al-4V was investigated in fatigue at various stress amplitudes ranging from the high cycle fatigue (HCF) to the low cycle fatigue (LCF) regime. The base material was composed of hot-rolled Ti-6Al-4V plate that presented a strong crystallographic texture. The welds were characterized in terms of microstructure using electron backscatter diffraction and hardness measurements. The microstructural gradients across the weld zone and thermomechanically affected zone of the linear friction welds are discussed in terms of the crystallographic texture, grain shape and hardness levels, relative to the parent material. The location of crack nucleation under fatigue loading was analyzed relative to the local microstructural features and hardness gradients. Though crack nucleation was not observed within the weld or thermomechanically affected zones, its occurrence within the base material in LCF appears to be affected by the welding process. In particular, by performing high resolution digital image correlation during LCF, the crack nucleation site was related to the local accumulation of plastic deformation in the vicinity of the linear friction weld.