Gigacycle fatigue behavior of a cast aluminum alloy under biaxial bending: experiments with a new piezoelectric fatigue testing device

A new ultrasonic fatigue testing device has been developed to test specimens under biaxial loading at 20 kHz. A flat smooth specimen with a disc geometry is placed on a circumferential frame and cyclically loaded at the center of its upper face. Disc bending generates a biaxial proportional stress state at the center of the lower face. Any positive loading ratio can be applied. A cast aluminum alloy (used to produce cylinder heads) has been tested under biaxial loading using this device in order to determine its fatigue strength at 109 cycles under high hydrostatic pressure. Self-heating is moderate but macroscopic fatigue cracks after testing are very long. First results in VHCF regime are consistent with literature results obtained under similar stress state for the same material, but in HCF regime and at 20 Hz.