Work Package 3

Residual stress relaxation under fatigue loading in downscaled springs. WP3 contains the experimental investigations on downscaled components (monoleaves) made of the serial steel grade (51CrV4) and subject to the serial manufacturing process (serial quenching/annealing, surface SSP). Therewith, and in conjunction with corresponding results from WP2, the serial state or “reference point” will be fully characterized, against which the improvements of WP4 will be measured. In the context of WP3, all activities regarding the development and validation of a theoretical model to calculate residual stress relaxation and its implementation into FEM-based process simulation and, subsequently, fatigue life calculation will be executed. This model will be also used in WP4 and WP5.