A History of Fatigue
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Pergamon
Engineering Fracture Mechanics Vol. 54, No. 2, pp. 263-300, 1996 Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd. 0013-7944(95)00178-6 Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved 0013-7944/96 $15.00+ 0.00
A HISTORY OF FATIGUEt
WALTER SCHLITZ IABG, D-85521 Ottobrunn, Germany Abstract--The history of fatigue from 1838 to the present is described in detail, with special emphasis on the German contribution in the time period of 1920-1945. A number of distinguished scientists and engineers, and their contributions to the further development of fatigue knowledge are specifically mentioned. Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.
1. I N T R O D U C T I O N MANY BOOKSand papers about fatigue start with a more or less detailed account of the historical development of this branch of technology; they are, however, mostly limited to the description of results. With the present paper, the author strives for an evaluation of the importance of scientists and engineers and their work for the further development of fatigue technology and knowledge. For this evalution, two criteria were established: • Were the results of the work useful for the following generations or not? A positive example would be, for example, the Palmgren-Miner rule, still being employed the world over, 50 respectively 71 yrs after its publication. A negative example would be the "Damage Line" of French, which has only caused confusion, or the "over-" and "understressing" works of Kommers, which uselessly haunted people's minds for decades. • Does the work in question only contain results or did the researcher also draw conclusions? A positive example would be W6hler's allowable stresses for railway axles in the finite life region. Since the author obviously knows the important German fatigue efforts better than those of foreign engineers, this paper possibly has an entirely undesired nationalistic German touch. On the other hand, practically all Anglo-American historical descriptions of fatigue
Pergamon
Engineering Fracture Mechanics Vol. 54, No. 2, pp. 263-300, 1996 Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd. 0013-7944(95)00178-6 Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved 0013-7944/96 $15.00+ 0.00
A HISTORY OF FATIGUEt
WALTER SCHLITZ IABG, D-85521 Ottobrunn, Germany Abstract--The history of fatigue from 1838 to the present is described in detail, with special emphasis on the German contribution in the time period of 1920-1945. A number of distinguished scientists and engineers, and their contributions to the further development of fatigue knowledge are specifically mentioned. Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.
1. I N T R O D U C T I O N MANY BOOKSand papers about fatigue start with a more or less detailed account of the historical development of this branch of technology; they are, however, mostly limited to the description of results. With the present paper, the author strives for an evaluation of the importance of scientists and engineers and their work for the further development of fatigue technology and knowledge. For this evalution, two criteria were established: • Were the results of the work useful for the following generations or not? A positive example would be, for example, the Palmgren-Miner rule, still being employed the world over, 50 respectively 71 yrs after its publication. A negative example would be the "Damage Line" of French, which has only caused confusion, or the "over-" and "understressing" works of Kommers, which uselessly haunted people's minds for decades. • Does the work in question only contain results or did the researcher also draw conclusions? A positive example would be W6hler's allowable stresses for railway axles in the finite life region. Since the author obviously knows the important German fatigue efforts better than those of foreign engineers, this paper possibly has an entirely undesired nationalistic German touch. On the other hand, practically all Anglo-American historical descriptions of fatigue