Fatigue life of cold‐expanded fastener holes with interference‐fit fasteners at short edge margins

The fatigue life of 7075‐T6 aluminium specimens with countersunk fastener holes with cold expansion and interference‐fit fasteners with short edge margins was studied. The study was performed experimentally and through finite element analysis. The experiments measured the total fatigue life and crack growth. The results from the finite element analysis consisted of tangential residual stress profiles, which were combined with applied cyclic stresses for fatigue analysis. The experiments showed that the fatigue life improved with interference‐fit fasteners and cold expansion at all edge margins. The fatigue life also increased with increasing edge margin. The finite element results were used to make fatigue life predictions that corresponded reasonably well with the experimental results.