Aluminum Fatigue

Aluminum is a tricky material. Did you know that it has no fatigue limit? Typical (ferrous) metals receive stress to a certain number of cycles, after which they do not become weaker. This is called the fatigue limit, and past this limit, practically infinite loading cycles will not cause failure. Aluminum on the other hand, has a finite number of loading cycles until it will ultimately reach failure, no matter how small the load stress of each cycle.

Think about the things around us built out of aluminum. You’re bicycle rack on your car, your rain design mStand, and airplanes. Each of these things is slowly inching towards certain eventual failure due to fatigue stress. Aluminum is born of a violent process, then welded with fire and electricity ultimately to shine in beauty unmolested by objectionable corrosion for a finite amount of time before being inevitably recycled.

*****
Written by Dania Es on 01 October 2020