Room temperature creep–fatigue response of selected copper alloys for high heat flux applications

Two copper alloys, dispersion-strengthened CuAl25 and precipitation-hardened CuCrZr, were examined under fatigue and fatigue with hold time loading conditions. Tests were carried out at room temperature and hold times were imposed at maximum tensile and maximum compressive strains. It was found that hold times could be damaging even at room temperature, well below temperatures typically associated with creep. Hold times resulted in shorter fatigue lives in the high cycle fatigue, long life regime (i.e., at low strain amplitudes) than those of materials tested under the same conditions without hold times. The influence of hold times on fatigue life in the low cycle fatigue, short life regime (i.e., at high strain amplitudes) was minimal. When hold time effects were observed, fatigue lives were reduced with hold times as short as two seconds. Appreciable stress relaxation was observed during the hold period at all applied strain levels in both tension and compression. In all cases, stresses relaxed quickly within the first few seconds of the hold period and much more gradually thereafter. The CuAl25 alloy showed a larger effect of hold time on reduction of high cycle fatigue life than did the CuCrZr alloy. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.