Fatigue crack growth model and mechanism of a random fiber SMC composite

Abstract The primary purpose of this study is to investigate the fatigue crack growth rate and mechanism in a random fiber sheet molding compound (SMC) composite. The fatigue crack growth rate in this study was measured using a compliance approach. The fatigue crack growth rate in the SMC studied here shows a good agreement with a new power law model proposed earlier. This new model takes into account not only the effect of the stress intensity factor range, but also the effect of crack growth at various stages of loading using a weight average stress intensity factor. It was observed that this new model can represent the fatigue crack growth rate of the SMC at three different load ratios in a single unifying curve.