Piezoelectric fatigue testing machines and devices

During the 1990s several methods have been developed around the word in order to test specimens at very high fatigue life. In our laboratory an ultrasonic fatigue testing system was designed and built 15 years ago to determine crack growth threshold and S–N curve of metals. Those first results were published in ASTM STP 1231 (1994), ASTM STP1411 (2002) and in proceedings of Fatigue 2002. This paper sums up the progress of such fatigue testing machines and devices from this date.