Fatigue failure analysis of U75V rail material under Ⅰ+Ⅱ mixed-mode loading: Characterization using peridynamics and experimental verification

Fatigue failure behavior of U75V rail material under Ⅰ+Ⅱ mixed-mode loading is analyzed and characterized in this work. A fatigue crack propagation experiment was carried out on U75V rail material under mixed-mode loading for R = 0.1. Then, based on the Ordinary State-Based Peridynamic (OSB PD) theory, bond strain rate and bond energy release rate methods were used to characterize the fatigue failure behavior of the rail material. Finally, the simulation results were compared with experimental results in terms of crack propagation length, path and angle to evaluate the characterization effects of both methods. The conclusions were as follows: under single mode I loading, both methods could accurately characterize the fatigue failure behavior of the rail material. However, compared with the bond strain rate method, the bond energy release rate method could provide a more accurate characterization under I + II mixed-mode loading.