Fatigue life prediction of cracked padded plates

The fatigue crack propagation analyses of padded plates are conducted to predict the crack growth behaviour under various loading conditions. The fatigue life of a padded plate with a single edge crack originating from the weld toe is calculated using the weight function approach. The fatigue strength of padded plates with different pad thickness under remote loading conditions was investigated and compared to the T-plate joint. The improvement of the fatigue strength of the pad design is verified.
  The thickness effect of the padded plate was investigated using the fracture mechanics approach. The geometrically similar model pairs with different initial crack sizes were investigated under remote loading conditions. It was shown that the thickness effect depends on both stress concentration and initial crack size.