Exercise

In this tutorial, a control arm loaded by brake force and vertical force is used, as shown in Figure 1. Two load time histories acquired for 2545 seconds with 1 HZ, shown in Figure 2, are adopted. The SN curve of the material used in the control arm is shown in Figure 4. Because a crack always initiates from the surface, a skin meshed with shell elements is designed to cover the solid elements, which can improve the accuracy of calculation as well.

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Figure 1. Model of the Control Arm for Fatigue Analysis

rd2070a_load_time
Figure 2. Load Time History for Vertical Force

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Figure 3. Load Time History for Braking Force

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Figure 4. SN Curve

The model being used for this exercise is that of a control arm, as shown in Figure 1. Loads and boundary conditions and two static loadcases have already been defined on this model.