TTERWORTH Int. J, Fatigue Vol, 17, No. 5, pp.

365-373, 1995
I N E M A tq ~" Copyright © 1995 Elsevier Science Limited
Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved
0142-1123/95/$10.00

Detailed evaluation of methods for estimation

of fatigue properties
Jun-Hyub Park and Ji-Ho Song
Department of Automation and Design Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of
Science and Technology, 207-43, Cheongry angri-dong, Dongdaemun-gu, Seoul,
Korea
(Received 7 November 1994)

Using extensive experimental strain-life curve data on 116 steels, 16 aluminium alloys and six titanium
alloys, nearly all methods currently available for estimation of fatigue properties from simple tensile
data are discussed in detail. The four-point correlation method, the universal slopes method, Mitchell's
method, the modified universal slopes method, the uniform material law by Bgumel and Seeger. and
the modified four-point correlation method by Ong are evaluated in a quantitative manner by using
new criteria proposed in this work, along with conventional error criterion. The modified universal
slopes, Seeger's and Ong's methods give good life predictions. Among them, the modified universal
slopes method provides best results.

(Keywords: fatigue properties; fatigue life prediction; estimation method; simple tensile data; evaluation criteria)

Fatigue analysis is very important in the design
of mechanical structures and components. Fatigue
properties of materials are essential for fatigue analysis.
Fatigue properties such as stress-life ( S - N ) or
strain-life (e-N) curves are usually obtained by
performing fatigue tests. However, as fatigue testing
requires a lot of time and effort, there have been
many attempts to estimate fatigue properties from
simple tensile data.
Manson ~ first proposed two methods, the four-point
correlation method and universal slopes method, to
estimate the strain-life curve composed of the plastic
and elastic lines on a log-log scale, using only
tensile data. Mitchell-~ has proposed another method,
particularly suitable for steels. Recently, B~iumel and
Seeger. 3 have proposed a new method, the uniform
material law. In contrast, Ong 4 has proposed a modified
four-point correlation method.
The universal slopes method, in which the slopes of
the plastic and elastic lines are universalized as -0.6
and -0.12 respectively for all materials, has been
widely used for its simplicity and ease of application.
However, the method tends to produce overconserv-
ative estimates of life in the very high cycle life range.
To improve the original universal slopes method,
Muralidharan and Manson 5 have proposed a new,
modified universal slopes method.
The assumption that the slope of the plastic
strain-life relationship (the plastic line) on a log-log
plot is almost constant for all materials is relatively
well accepted. However, the slope of the elastic
strain-life relationship (the elastic line) has been
frequently observed to vary over a relatively wide
range and to be material-dependent. Considering this
material dependence, Mitchell proposed a method to
estimate the slope of the elastic line from the tensile
strength of material.
The uniform material law proposed by Baumel and
Seeger. has been derived from a large amount of
fatigue data collected by them. This method may be
said to be a kind of universal slopes method, which
assigns different slopes to unalloyed and low-alloy steels
and to aluminium and titanium alloys respectively. One
advantage of the method is that only the tensile
strength of the material is needed for estimation of
the strain-life curve, in contrast to other methods,
which also require the data of the reduction in area
or the fracture ductility of the material. Using the
fatigue data collected by them, they checked the
prediction capability of the uniform material law and
the modified universal slopes method. They found
that both methods showed larger deviations between
the predicted and experimental results for aluminium
and titanium alloys and for high-alloy steels, compared
with unalloyed and low-alloy steels.
Quite recently, Ong 6 has evaluated three commonly
used methods, the four-point correlation method, the
original universal slopes method and Mitchell's method
(or the method proposed by Socie et al.), and found
that the four-point correlation method and the original
universal slopes method give satisfactory results, while
Mitchell's method gives inferior predictions. Moreover,
he proposed a new, modified four-point correlation
method to improve the original four-point correlation
method. However, the data used for the evaluation
were not actual experimental data but calculated values
from the fatigue properties of materials provided in
the A S M Metals Handbook 7.

365
366 Jun-Hyub Park and Ji-Ho Song

Though many useful estimation methods have been value of elastic strain at Nf = 1 0 4 cycles on the elastic
proposed as described above, there is little work to line.
evaluate them extensively, particularly using actual As the true fracture stress ~rf is not always given in
experimentally obtained data on a variety of materials. the literature, Manson ~ recommended the following
The importance of fatigue data has been emphasized approximation suggested by J. O'Brien:
recently in several remarkable fatigue data books,
containing a large amount of experimental fatigue data trf = ~r~(1 + El) (2)
for a broad range of materials, published in Japan
and Germany. Original universal slopes method by Manson ~
In this work, using the actual fatigue data available In this method, the coefficients C~, b, Cp, c of
in fatigue data books, the predictive accuracy of all Equation (1) are as given in the following equation:
the estimation methods described above is discussed.
In general, the accuracy of the estimation methods Ae = Ae~ + Aep = 3.5 E N ( °.'2 + o-°f.~N~°,~' (3)
has been evaluated in terms of the error or deviation
of the predicted values from the actual ones. However,
it seems that the error criterion on its own is not
Method by MitchelF
always sufficient for detailed discussion of estimation
methods. Some additional criteria are proposed in this In this method, the strain-life relation is expressed
work to examine in more detail the predictive accuracy using the strain amplitude Ae/2 and the number of
of estimation methods. As the fatigue data used reversals 2Nf as
here for discussion of estimation methods are almost A~ = Aee + Aep
independent from the data from which the estimation 2 2 2
methods have been derived, the conclusions obtained
in this work may be unbiased and highly reliable. !
: tyf (2Nf)h + e~ (2Nf) c (4)
E
M E T H O D S F O R E S T I M A T I O N OF F A T I G U E
P R O P E R T I E S F R O M TENSILE D A T A where ~} is the fatigue strength coefficient, b is the
fatigue strength exponent, e} is the fatigue ductility
The estimation methods to be discussed in this work coefficient and c is the fatigue ductility exponent. The
are briefly explained below. equation is represented graphically in Figure 2. 2N, in
the figure is the transition fatigue life at which the
Original four-point correlation method by Manson 1 elastic and plastic lines intersect. Mitchell suggested
The strain-life relation is usually expressed as the that for steels with hardness below 500 BHN,
sum of the elastic and plastic lines on a log-log scale
as follows: ~ ~ ~rf = au + 50 (ksi)
A ~ = A~. e "~ A~.p = C~N } + CpN'f" (1) = ~u + 345 (MPa) (5)
where Ae, A~ and A% are the total, elastic and plastic
strains respectively, and Nf is the number of cycles to !o - 1o
failure. In the original four-point correlation method,
b = (6)
the coefficients C~, b, Cp, c of Equation (1) are log(lO o) - log(lO 6)
calculated using the four points, P1-P4, located on
the elastic and plastic lines as shown in Figure 1. i log 2(o'~ + 345)
= - ~ log = -a
Every point is determined from tensile data: the true ~' \ trB / [ O-B J
fracture stress ~rf, the tensile strength 0% and the
fracture ductility el. Ae* in the figure indicates the

-- + _ c
~a

i pl a%}cp.~ ~5
"0 ] A£¢ Of ~' b

e'~
,

Ae~ = A ~

I~1 p4~, ~ I ~ t I
l0 0 2Nt 106 107

100 ..L 101 10 2 103 104 10 5 Number of reversals to failure,~d',lf

4
Number of cycles to failure, Nf Figure 2 Representation of strain amplitude versus number of
reversals to failure
Figure 1 Four-point correlation method by Manson
 Detailed evaluation of methods for estimation of fatigue properties 367

The slopes of the elastic and plastic lines for steels,

6 ~ ef = In 10 RA
where RA is the percentage reduction in area.
He further recommended constructing the plastic
line using an empirical representation of the hardness
versus transition fatigue life 2Nt, instead of using a
specific value of c. However, as the hardness-transition
life data are not always readily available, a constant
value of c = - 0 . 6 , which is regarded as an average
value of c for almost all materials, may be assigned
to the slope of the plastic line, for convenience.
The resulting equation will be
AtE __ A e c -~ A ~ p
-0.087 and -0.58, are very close to the values -0.09
and -0.56 in the modified universal slopes method.
However, the slope of the plastic line for aluminium
and titanium alloys, -0.69, is rather steep.
Modified four-point correlation method by Ong 4
To improve the original four-point correlation
method, this method uses the four points P I ' - P 4 '
shown in Figure 3, instead of the four points P1-P4
in Figure 1. The strain-life relation is given as
Ae Ae~ + Aep
-- = - __
2 2 2

9~- 2 2 = uf (2Nf)b + ~f(2Nf)c (12)

E
[-2( o-B + 3 4 5 )-]
(orB + 345) -U°gl ~ [ where
= E (2Nf) 6 L
b
+ ~,(2N,) "~ (8) = ~{log[ 016tt(r ) \'"8' ] -
This will be hereafter referred to as Mitchell's equation.

Modified universal slopes method by Muralidharan

and Manson 5 c = log 2~074 - log(e,)
As was briefly mentioned in the introduction, this
method has been proposed to improve the original crB 0.81 trl,-
universal slopes method, and expresses the strain-life
relation as
[ O.B \ 0 . 8 3 2
A e = 1.17[ /~) U~-°'°9 The value of uf is needed also in this method as in
the original four-point correlation method. Ong has
/O" \-(I.53
155 noted that the value of (re can be approximated by
+ 0.0266 ~ I - EB ) N?°56 (9) Equation (2).
This method provides lower universalized slopes for
the elastic and plastic lines than the original method. F A T I G U E D A T A F O R DISCUSSION OF
The crB/E term is newly introduced into the coefficient ESTIMATION M E T H O D S
of the plastic line, indicating that the tensile strength The fatigue data used are strain-life data obtained
of the material also has a marked effect on the life in through fatigue testing, which are contained mainly in
the low-cycle fatigue. the databooks, the JSME Data Book: Fatigue of Metals
IV 8 and Materials Data for Cyclic Loading by Seeger
Uniform material law by Biiumel and Seeger 3
and others 3'9. In particular, we have used the data
In this method, two different expressions for strain obtained under the so-called normal testing condition:
versus life are used for unalloyed and low-alloy steels that is, on polished smooth or hourglass-type specimens
and for aluminium and titanium alloys as follows. tested in air at room temperature under axial loading
For unalloyed and low-alloy steels:
Ae -- A~ e -{- A E p

2 2 2 pi
.... -E-\~,,f] -b 0.59t~2Nf) -°58 (lO)

where
O"B
--<~ 0.003,0= 1
.@ E
E

O'BE> 0.003, 0 = 1.375 - 1 2 5 . 0 ~

For aluminium and titanium alloys:

Ae = Ae~ + A%
2 2 2 10° 104 106
Number of reversals to failure,2Nf
= 11.ut~-Iz.,zvf!gc'lO'B['~--(I.095
31~! q'- 0.35(2Nr) -°'69 (11) Figure 3 Modifiedfour-point correlation method by Ong
368 Jun-Hyub Park and Ji-Ho Song

at a stress ratio of R,~ ( = O ' m a x / O ' m i n ) = --i or a strain
ratio of R~ ( = emaJer, i , ) = - - 1 . Run-out data are
excluded. Further, only the data on materials with
both data of tensile strength o-B and percent reduction
in area RA (or fracture ductility el) are utilized.
The data used are listed in Table 1, classified by
data sources and materials. The total number of e-N
curves is 315 and the total number of experimental
strain-life data points is 2717 obtained on 138 materials.
For convenience, each individual strain-life datum is
referred to a e - N data point, and a set of ~-N data
points forming an E-N curve is hereafter referred to
a (E-N) data set. To apply successfully the evaluation
criteria to be proposed later, data sets that consist of
less than four data points are not considered in
the discussion. When needed, the value of ~rf is
approximated by Equation (2).
tions, as shown in Figure 4, where Np and Ne are the
predicted and experimental lives respectively. The
values calculated by Equation (13) are all the same
for the three methods. However, as can be easily
found, method C can hardly explain the experimental
results and method B may be expected to give superior
predictions to method A for a wider range of life.
This drawback in the error criterion may be overcome
by considering the linear relationship between the
predicted and experimental lives in the following
manner.
If the relationship between the predicted and exper-
imental lives is approximated by a least-squares line
as
log(2Np) = a + N o g ( 2 N , . ) (14)

CRITERIA FOR EVALUATION OF 10~ Method! MethodA / / ,/

+ A ) / McthodB/
ESTIMATION METHODS
A criterion most frequently used is the error criterion,
which evaluates the predictive accuracy of an estimation .ili
method in terms of the fraction of data falling within Method C //~/' NP = I'Nf
a scatterband of a specified factor s as follows:
Number of data falling within

The experimental value ~< s

Total number of data (13)
There is a problem inherent in the criterion, 10° Experimental life, Nf 109
as illustrated below. Assume that three different
estimation methods provide three different life predic- Figure 4 Illustration of drawback inherent in the error criterion

Table 1 Data used for comparison of estimation methods

Data source

Materials Data ]br Materials' Data for

JSME Data Book." Cyclic Loading Vol Cyclic Loading Suppl.
Materials unit Fatigue o f Metals IV ~ 1-4" 1' S A E data"' Total

Number of 9 35 28 0 72
Unalloyed E - N curves
steels Number of data 51 317 234 0 6(12
points
Number of 13 8O 42 2 137
Low-alloy e - N curves
steels Number of 87 903 299 27 1316
data points
Number of 23 36 9 0 68
High-alloy ~ - N curves
steels Number of 133 3(13 69 0 505
data points
Number of 12 1(1 7 0 29
Aluminium E-N curves
alloys Number of 100 76 64 (I 24(I
data points
Number of 0 9 0 0 9
Titanium E - N curves
alloys Number of 0 54 0 0 54
data points
Number of 57 17(I 86 2 315
E-N curves
Total
Number of 371 1653 666 27 2717
data points
 Detailed evaluation of methods for estimation of fatigue properties 369

it can be said that the closer the values of intercept a In this work, the predictive accuracy of estimation
and slope/3 are to 0 and 1 respectively, the better the methods will be evaluated in a quantitative manner
estimation method is. And if a is rather greater than by using the evaluation measure defined below.
zero, the case when/3 is moderately smaller than unity
gives better predictions than the case when/3 is greater Fraction of data within a factor of s, E j s )
than unity. For a rather less than zero, the case As noted above, the error criterion can be expressed
when /3 is moderately greater than unity gives better by Equation (13), i.e. fraction of data within a factor
predictions than the case when/3 is smaller than unity. of s, Ef(s). A value of s of 3 is employed for life
Thus the values of a,/3 and (a + /3) can be utilized prediction. The evaluation value Er(s = 3) is given as
to evaluate the predictive accuracy of an estimation
method from the viewpoint of agreement between the Ef(s = 3) (15)
predicted and experimental lives. The drawback above Np 1
Number of data falling within 3_ <- Nr -< 3
described can be overcome by employing the values
of a, /3 and (a + /3) as additional criteria. Number of total data
In using the additional criteria, the following possi-
bility should be considered. Assume that Figure 5 The closer El(S) is to 1, the better the prediction.
shows the prediction results obtained by applying two Accordingly, all the evaluation measures to be here
estimation methods, D and E, to two (e-N) data sets employed will be formulated to be unity for ideally
I and II. That is, method D gives different least- good prediction.
squares lines for (e-N) data sets [ and II, while
providing a least-squares line of a ~ 0 and/3 ~ 1 for Goodness of fit between the predicted and
the combined data of data sets I and II, as shown in experimental values, E.~
Figure 5a. In contrast, method E gives nearly the Using the additional criteria presented above, the
same least-squares lines of a ~ 0 and /3 ~- 1 for both goodness of fit is defined for the combined data of all
data sets I and II, and also for the combined data of (e-N) data sets and for individual (E-N) data sets.
data sets I and II, as shown in Figure 5b. Limiting separately as
attention to only the results obtained for the combined
(l- IOftotal [) -c (1 - - l1 - - /-~total I )
data, methods D and E appear to be equally excellent (E.),,,,,,1 =
4
methods. However, it is evident from the results
obtained for individual (E-N) data sets that method (1--[1- O~total- ~[~tota I [)+(1--11-- r,,,,,[) (16)
E is preferable. + -- 4
The correlation coefficient between the predicted 1 /V
and experimental values, r, will also be one other (E.)D~c, = N ,=~ (E~,),
additional criterion. When two different methods
happen to provide identical least-squares lines, an
estimation method that gives a higher r value is
N i=1
z.., [ 4
preferable.
~+ (1 -- 1] -- ~ ' - - ~'1)
4 + (1 -- [I - - ' " l ) ] (17)

--t--- fore Ncurvel I I1 ff where the subscripts, total and i, refer Io the combined
--m-- fore N c u r v e l l l T, 1+I1
for curves (1+ Ill I i// data of all (e-N) data sets and the ith (e-N) data set
/ / respectively, and N is the number of (e-N) data sets.
(E,0Dset of Equation (17) represents the goodness of
fit for individual (e-N) data sets.

C O M P A R I S O N OF ESTIMATION M E T H O D S
i "2' Life predictions were performed with the aforemen-
z~ / tioned six estimation methods on the five material
a) Method D groups listed in Table 1. Figure 6 shows a typical
result of life predictions obtained on low-alloy steels,
If/I+II•
• for which the largest amount of data is obtained among
the five material groups. In the figure, the perfect
e~
correlation line and a factor of 3 scatter band are
/ expressed by the dashed and solid lines respectively.
The equation and the value of r in the figure represent
./ "A"
the result of least-square analysis and the correlation
N,=j4" /
coefficient for the combined data respectively.
As can be found from Figure 6a, the predicted data
by the four-point correlation method tend to level off
i
b) Method E in the long-life range, resulting in over-conservative
life predictions. Such a trend is also discernible in the
Experimental life, Nf
result for the original universal slopes method shown
Figure 5 Application of least-squares analysis to the predicted data in Figure 6b. In contrast, the modified universal slopes
by two different estimation methods method, the uniform material law by B~iumel and
 370 Jun-Hyub Park and Ji-Ho Song

109
109
a) Four-PointCorrelati,
l0 s
10 s
b) OriginalUniversalSlopes
107
Z-
t"q Z
107 0 0
10n t"q
106
>
105
105
o o~8 0
>
104
104 oJ 1 e°°°
h3 103 [] EF o
;.~ 103
10 2
102
10 ~ 0.893
r =
Iog(2Np)=1.375+0.5241og(2Nr ) 101 r = 0.936
10° ~ ' ' ~ ~ l °)=0.858+0.781
g ( 2 Nlog(2Nr)
10 °

10° 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 10s 109
10° 101 102 103 104 105 106 I07 10s 109
Experimentalreversals,2N Experimentalreversals,2Nf

109
10 9
c)ModifiedUniversal d)Mitchell'sMethod
10 8 SlopesMethod 10 s ee m
engB ~no ~9
107
Z
t"q Z 107
106 t'-,I
106
105
> ~ 1¢
~ 104
~ 104
;~ 103 I)
103
F
~
~ 102 [] m m ii dim
~ 102
101 r = 0.936
I0° ~ l o g ( )=0.100+0.9531og(2Nr)
2 N I01 [,_ ~_) fro// r = 0.922
log(2Nv)=0.642+0.9271og(2Nr )
10°
I0° l01 102 103 l04 105 106 107 108 109 ]0 ° l01 10 2 10 3 10 4 10 5 10 6 10 7 l0 8 10 9
Experimentalreversals,2Nf Experimentalreversals,2Nf

109 109

108
e) Seeger'sMeth°d ~~ ~ ~ 108
If)Ong'sMeth°d ~
mull •
107 ~k

'@
106 , ~ 10 o |
z~ . An ~ ai D,
105
> ~1~ ~> 105 !~- I•
1o4 ~

103 ~' .~ 103

lOj r = 0.934 r = 0.935

10° ~ log(2Np)=0.330+0.9161og(2Nf) ll010
° ~ I°g(2Np)=0"563+0"8621°g(2NI)

l0 ° 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 l08 109 10 ° lO 1 102 103 104 105 106 107 l0 x 109

Experimentalreversals,2Nf Experimentalreversals,2Nf
Figure 6 Comparison of the predicted and experimental fatigue lives for low-alloy steels
 Detailed evaluation of methods for estimation of fatigue properties 371

Seeger. and the modified four-point correlation method

by Ong provide relatively good life predictions. How-
ever, Mitchell's method tends to give considerably
non-conservative predictions in the longer-life range.
A close inspection of Figure 6 reveals that the
modified universal slopes method tends to give slightly
conservative predictions at shorter lives, but non-
conservative predictions at long lives. A similar tend-
ency can be found for Seeger's method. The predicted
data due to Ong's method are found on average to
fall slightly above the perfect correlation line.
The trend observed on low-alloy steels was observed
consistently on other materials. However, particularly
on aluminium alloys, a few excessively non-conserva-
tive predictions were observed at short lives for all
the methods except Mitchell's.
Unless otherwise stated, Figure 6 is hereafter
employed as representative of the results for all
materials, for convenience.
Table 2 shows comparisons of the predictive accuracy
of estimation methods on the basis of the evaluation
valu__es defined in the previous section. The values of
E, E and E in the table are given as
3
= k_7:t - = Ef(s = 3) + (Ea)total + (Ea)Dset
3 3
5
(Ek)iUi
Ek -- - j = l~ ---
ENj
J=l
EEk E l ( s = 3) + ~ +
: k=l = . . . . . total _ Oset
3 3
(20)
where the subscripts j and k refer to the jth material
and kth evaluation value respectively, and Nj is the
number of (e-N) data sets of the jth material.
The bold-faced figures in the table represent the
best prediction for each evaluation item. First, giving
attention to the result on low-alloy steels along with
Figure 6, the evaluation value of fraction of data
E f ( s = 3 ) is nearly the same for the original and
modified universal slopes methods, Seeger's and Ong's
methods, among which Ong's method gives the best
predictions. With respect to the goodness of fit, the
modified universal slopes method is the best for the
combined data, while Seeger's is the best for individual
(E-N) data sets. It is interesting that the method giving
the best result differs depending on the evaluation item.
Considering the evaluation value averaged over three
items, E, the modified universal slopes method may
be said to be the best for low-alloy steels.
Based on the value of E, the modified universal
slopes method is also the best for unalloyed and high-
alloy steels. For unalloyed and high-alloy steels,
(18) Seeger's method also gives good results, comparable
to the modified universal slopes method. On the other
hand, Mitchell's method is the best for aluminium
(19) alloy, while Ong's is the best for titanium.

Table 2 Comparison of estimation methods in terms of evaluation values

Original Modified
Material Four-point universal universal Mitchell's Seeger's Ong's
group E value correlation slopes slopes method method method

Unalloyed Ef(s = 3) 0.570 0.769 0.824 0.738 0.805 0.811

steels (Ea)total 0.431 0.669 0.925 0.774 0.885 0.868
(E~)D~ 0.234 0.462 0.542 0.330 0.569 0.49l
E 0.412 0.634 0.764 0.614 0.753 0.723
Low-alloy Ef(s = 3) 0.548 0.750 0.764 0.532 0.768 0.793
steels (E,)~o,, 0.229 0.444 0.747 0.528 0.654 0.562
(E~)Ds~, 0.224 0.503 0.621 0.514 0.632 0.614
0.334 0.566 0.711 0.524 0.684 0.656
High-alloy Er(s = 3) 0.663 0.865 0.867 0.60/) 0.846 0.865
steels (E,),,,~ 0.313 0.648 0.956 0.808 0.970 0.801
(E~)D~e, 0.4549 0.645 0.656 0.605 0.662 0.681
0.477 0.719 0.826 0.671 0.826 0.782
Aluminium Ef(s = 3) 0.567 0.800 0.796 0.721 0.738 0.713
alloys (E~)~,,~ -0.043 0.586 0.720 0.907 0.877 0.723
(E,)Ds~, 0.437 0.666 0.704 O.734 0.735 0.712
0.320 0.684 0.740 0.787 0.783 0.716
Titanium Ef(s = 3) 0.519 0.759 0.852 0.648 0.778 0.870
alloys ( E,),,,~ 0.331 0.558 0.892 0.847 0.746 0.921
( E,)D~, 0.462 0.500 0.448 0.580 0.472 0.592
0.437 0.606 0.731 0.692 0.665 0.794
All Ef(s = 3) 0.576 0.780 0.801 0.609 0.788 0.805
materials = 0.271 0.556 0.834 0.688 0.798 0.708
(E~)~o,~J 0.303 0.539 0.613 0.514 0.629 0.609
( E~ )1. . . .
Total ~ 0.384 0.627 0.751 0.606 0.739 (/.709
372 Jun-Hyub Park and Ji-Ho Song
In the evaluation averaged o v e r all material groups
and expressed by the value of E, almost the same
results are obtained as described above on low-alloy
steels,
In the total evaluation represented by the value of
~, the modified universal slopes method is best and
Seeger's method is next best, followed by Ong's.
DISCUSSION
From the results in the preceding section, the features
of each estimation method can be summarized as
follows.
The predictive accuracy of both the four-point
correlation method and the original universal slopes
method is considered inferior to the other methods,
because the prediction results from both methods tend
to level off in the long-life range, as noted in Figure
6. As can be found from the value of Ef(s = 3) in
Table 2, only about 58% of the data predicted by the
original four-point correlation method fall within a
factor of 3 scatterband, indicating that the method
may not be recommended.
The original universal slopes method may be satisfac-
tory in the respect that about 80% of the data fall
within a factor of 3 scatterband, However, the goodness
o f fit due to th_e method is inferior, as the values of
(E~)tot~l and (E~)Dset in Table 2 indicate.
It is worth noting that the above two methods tend
to provide slightly non-conservative predictions at
short lives, but are excessively overconservative at
long lives. This fact has been already pointed out by
Manson and Muralidharan 5, particularly for the original
universal slopes method.
In contrast, the modified universal slopes method,
developed to overcome this drawback of the original
universal slopes method, tends to give slightly conserva-
tive predictions at shorter lives, but is non-conservative
at long lives, as already noted in Figure 6c. While the
fraction of data within a factor of 3 scatterband is
80%, as can be found in Table 2, the goodness of fit
is remarkably improved in the modified universal
slopes method. As the equation in Figure 6c shows,
the values of intercept (~ = 0.100) and slope
(/3 = 0.953) are very close to 0 and 1 respectively.
This result implies that the modified universal slopes
method gives accurate predictions.
As can be seen in Figure 6d, Mitchell's method also
provides a value of slope, /3 = 0.927, relatively close
to 1, indicating excellent direct correspondence
between the predicted and experimental lives. How-
ever, the value of the intercept, a = 0,64, is relatively
high, leading to non-conservative predictions over the
entire life range. Consequently, only about 60% of
the data fall within a factor of 3 scatterband as listed
in Table 2.
Good direct correspondence (/3 = 0.914) between
the predicted and experimental lives can be observed
also in Figure 6e for Seeger's method. In particular,
the method is the best in goodness of fit for individual
data sets, as can be found from the value of (E~)D~ct
in Table 2. The fraction of data falling within a factor
of 3 scatterband is 79%.
As can be seen in Figure 6f, Ong's method gives
the value of slope, /3 = 0.862, less than those for the
above three methods, and a relatively high intercept
value, c~ = 0,563. Consequently, Ong's method is
inferior to both the modified universal slopes method
and Seeger's method in the goodness of fit, and
tends to provide non-conservative predictions more
frequently, compared with the modified universal
slopes method. The fraction of data within a factor of
3 scatterband is slightly more than 80%.
It can be noted from the above discussion that the
modified universal slopes method, Seeger's method
and Ong's method all give reasonably good life
predictions, with about 80% of the data falling within
a factor of 3 scatterband. Based on the goodness of
fit, the modified universal slopes method is the best
and Seeger's method is the next best. While not shown
here explicitly, the modified universal slopes method
has the fewest non-conservative data falling outside
the upper line of a factor of 3 scatterband, in
comparison with other two methods.
In conclusion, the modified universal slopes method
can be recommended as the best estimation method
at present. This method essentially requires the elastic
modulus E, tensile strength o-B and fracture ductility
el, of the material. When the fracture ductility is not
available, Seeger's method, which requires only the
elastic modulus and tensile strength, may be utilized
as an alternative to obtain satisfactory results.
On the other hand, Ong's method, while being a
good estimation method, requires the true fracture
stress o-t,, which is not always given, in addition to the
above three material properties.
Although not shown here, the fraction of data falling
within a factor of 2 scatterband is found to be about
60% for all the above three methods. The major
conclusions obtained above for a factor of 3 scatterband
are hardly affected by employing a factor of 2.
It has already been noted in the introduction that,
on its own, the error criterion expressed by Equation
(15) is not always sufficient for detailed evaluation of
estimation methods, Based on the error criterion
alone, the original universal slopes method may be
said to be one of the best estimation methods, as the
fraction of data falling within a factor of 3 (or 2)
scatterband amounts to 78% (or 60%), comparable
to the results due to the above three methods,
However, the original universal slopes method is in
practice inferior to the modified universal slopes
method as reported by Manson and Muralidharan ~.
Such a fact can be easily clarified in a quantitative
manner by using the additional criteria proposed here,
as Table 2 shows.
CONCLUSION
The predictive accuracy of various methods developed
to estimate fatigue properties from simple tensile data
is quantitatively evaluated by using the additional
criteria proposed in this work. with the conventional
error criterion, The conclusions obtained are summar-
ized as follows:
1. New criteria based on a least-squares analysis
between the predicted and experimental fatigue
lives are proposed to evaluate estimation methods.
2. The three methods - the modified universal slopes,
Seeger's and Ong's methods - give reasonably
good life predictions. Among them, the modified
universal slopes method provides the best results.
 Detailed evaluation of methods for estimation of fatigue properties
3. Consequently, the modified universal slopes method
can be recommended as the best estimation method
at present. When the fracture ductility required by
the method is not available, Seeger's method may
be utilized as an alternative to obtain satisfactory
results.
4. The fraction of data falling within a factor of 3 (or
2) scatterband is found to be about 80% (or 60%)
for all the above three methods.
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