Analysis of near-tip fatigue crack path bifurcation in metallic materials

This article studies plasticity-induced fatigue crack growth retardation in metals caused by crack path bifurcation in the near-tip region. To this end, the finite element method was used to model the crack with its bifurcated tip under several stress intensity factor (SIF) ranges. The results show the appearance of a retardation effect in the fatigue crack growth rate of the bifurcated crack in relation to the growth rate of the fully straight crack.