LAUSR

Abstract This study aims to provide an overview of numerical and experimental work, related to crack nucleation under fretting fatigue conditions. In fretting fatigue, multiaxial loads and severe stress gradients are present at the contact interface, which can lead to failure. The damage process, in general, is considered as a two-phase phenomenon, namely, nucleation and propagation. Various damage models and approaches are available in literature to model each phase. In the present work, different criteria, related to nucleation phase, are classified based on the approach used to define failure. These approaches include, critical plane approach, stress invariant approach, fretting specific parameters and continuum damage mechanics. Apart from theoretical background, the work related to the applications of these approaches to fretting fatigue problems is also presented. It is observed that, to analyse various aspects, intricate details near the contact interface and mechanisms involved in fretting fatigue, the strength of finite element method can be employed. In the light of numerical and experimental observations, comparison between different approaches, common sources of errors in prediction and generalized conclusions are presented.