Fatigue
Occurs when a material experiences lengthy periods of cyclic or repeated stresses which can lead to failure at stress levels much lower than the tensile or yield strength of the material.
- Fatigue is estimated to be responsible for approximately 90% of all metallic failures
- Failure occurs rapidly and without warning.
The stresses acting repeatedly upon the material may be due to
- tension-compression type stresses
- bending or twisting type stresses