Fatigue life prediction in a door hinge system under uni-axial and multi-axial loading conditions

This thesis presents the use of Finite Element (FE) based fatigue analysis to locate the critical point of crack initiation and predict life in a door hinge system that is subjected to both uni-axial and multi-axial loading. The results are experimentally validated. The FE model is further used to obtain an optimum design per the standard requirement in the ground vehicle industry. The accuracy of the results showed that FE based fatigue analysis can be successfully employed to reduce costly and time-consuming experiments in the preliminary design stage. Numerical analysis also provides the product design engineers with substantial savings, enabling the testing of fewer prototypes.