Fatigue strengthening of cracked steel plates with bonded Fe‐SMA strips

Prestressed fatigue strengthening of steel structures has been proven effective by numerous investigations. Bonded iron‐based shape memory alloy (Fe‐SMA) strengthening has shown a great potential in this regard, however, with limited corroborating studies. Moreover, a proper model for fatigue analysis of systems that are retrofitted with bonded Fe‐SMA strengthening is missing. In this study, an analytical model, coupling prestress analysis and fatigue analysis, is proposed. Four steel plates with central through‐thickness cracks were strengthened with use of bonded Fe‐SMA strips, and subsequently tested under fatigue loading after generating prestress via heating and cooling. The fatigue behavior predicted by the proposed model lies in excellent agreement with the fatigue testing results.