Since fatigue strength of spot weld affects structural rigidity and durability of the spot welded structures, safety and structural integrity of the structure are decided by fatigue strength of spot welded joint. Therefore, accurate stress analysis an...
Since fatigue strength of spot weld affects structural rigidity and durability of the spot welded structures, safety and structural integrity of the structure are decided by fatigue strength of spot welded joint. Therefore, accurate stress analysis and reasonable fatigue strength evaluation of spot welded joint are very important to determine its long-life fatigue design criterion. In general, the most typical and traditional method to determine the fatigue design criterion is ΔP-N<SUB>f</SUB> curve. However, since the relationship between fatigue load range (ΔP) and fatigue life (N<SUB>f</SUB>) is variable according to the material properties, the geometrical factors, and the mechanical condition, it is difficult to estimate fatigue strength synthetically taking account into the effects of the various geometrical factors. Thus, in this paper, fatigue design criteria of the spot welded lap joints were assessed using the maximum principle stress at the nugget edge of spot weld.