Low-Cycle Fatigue Failure Prediction of Steel Yield Energy Dissipating Devices Using a Simplified Method

One of the failure modes observed in steel yield energy dissipating devices (SYEDs) excited by a strong earthquake would be the low-cycle fatigue failure. Fatigue cracks of a SYED are prone to initiate at the notch areas where stress concentration is usually occurred, which is demonstrated by the cyclic tests and analyses carried out for this study. Since the fatigue failure of SYEDs dramatically deteriorates their structural capacities, the thorough investigation on their fatigue life is usually required. To do this, sophisticated modeling with considering a time-consuming and complicate fracture mechanism is generally needed. This study makes an effort to investigate the low-cycle fatigue life of SYEDs predicted by a simplified method utilizing damage indices and fatigue prediction equations that are based on the plastic strain amplitudes obtained from typical finite element analyses. This study shows that the low-cycle fatigue failure of SYEDs predicted by the simplified method can be conservatively in good agreement with the test results of SYED specimens prepared for experimental validation.