International Journal of Steel Structures 16(4): 1381-1396 (2016)

DOI 10.1007/s13296-016-0072-1
ISSN 1598-2351 (Print)
ISSN 2093-6311 (Online)

www.springer.com/journal/13296

Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting

Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe
Kyong-Ho Chang1, Jun-Tai Jeon2, and Chin-Hyung Lee3,*
1
Department of Civil and Environmental & Plant Engineering, Chung-Ang University,
84, Huksuk-ro, Dongjak-ku, Seoul 06974, Republic of Korea
2
Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Inha Technical College, 100, Inharo, Nam-Gu, Incheon 22212, Republic of Korea
3
The Graduate School of Construction Engineering, Chung-Ang University, 84, Huksuk-ro, Dongjak-ku, Seoul 06974, Republic of Korea

Abstract

This study attempts to characterize analytically the uniaxial ratcheting behavior of a girth-welded stainless steel pipe. Finite
element (FE) simulation of the girth butt welding is first carried out to obtain the weld-induced residual stresses employing
sequentially coupled three-dimensional (3-D) thermo-mechanical FE analysis technique. A cyclic constitutive model capable
of simulating the cyclic plastic behavior is presented in the framework of rate-independent plasticity theory. Verification of the
constitutive model is achieved by simulating the uniaxial strain- and stress-controlled cyclic loading tests and comparing the
predicted results with the experimental measurements. The verified constitutive model is then applied to the girth-welded steel
pipe subjected to uniaxial asymmetric stress cycling to evaluate the influence of residual stresses on the ratcheting behavior.
The results show that welding residual stresses are needed to be taken into account in an accurate estimation of the uniaxial
ratcheting behavior of the girth-welded steel pipe.

Keywords: Girth-welded stainless steel pipe, Ratcheting, Cyclic plasticity constitutive model, Nonlinear kinematic hardening
rule, Finite element analysis

1. Introduction the vulnerability to stress corrosion cracking, fatigue damage

Duplex stainless steels, with a microstructure comprised
of nearly equal proportions of ferrite and austenite, combine
the attractive properties of austenitic and ferritic steels:
high tensile strength and fatigue strength, good toughness
even at low temperatures, adequate formability and weld-
ability and excellent resistance to stress corrosion cracking,
pitting and general corrosion (Del Coz Díaz et al., 2010).
They, especially in the pipe form, find increasing use in
engineering applications associated with cyclic loads. In
practical situations, girth welding of duplex stainless steel
pipes is often needed owing to the long geometry relative
to the diameter and the wall-thickness. In a welded pipe,
the inevitable presence of welding residual stresses is well
recognized. The magnitude of tensile residual stresses in
and around the girth weld is high enough to be harmful
to the structural integrity of the girth-welded pipe, increasing
Received February 1, 2016; accepted October 26, 2016;
published online December 31, 2016
© KSSC and Springer 2016
*Corresponding author
Tel: +82-2-820-6878, Fax: +82-2-812-8331
E-mail: ifinder@hanmail.net
and brittle fracture (Wither, 2007). Moreover, when combined
with service loads, welding residual stresses can accelerate
the rate of fatigue crack growth and reduce the fatigue
life. It is well recognized that mechanical behavior of a
girth-welded steel pipe under monotonic loading is
significantly affected by welding residual stresses (Lee
and Chang, 2011; Lee and Chang, 2013a; Lee and Chang,
2013b; Lee et al., 2013; Lee et al., 2014a). However, the
structural response of a girth-welded steel pipe subjected
to cyclic loading has not been fully evaluated and is
entitled to special attention.
Ratcheting is the progressive directional accumulation
of permanent strain under cyclic plastic loading in the
presence of non-zero mean stress, which can be influenced
by the loading conditions such as mean stress and stress
amplitude. Ratcheting is considered as one of the most
critical structural problems to be investigated since it can
deteriorate the performance of a component through
combined effects of the fatigue damage and the plastic
strain accumulation (Paul et al., 2012). In last three decades,
a significant amount of research activities have been
performed to scrutinize the uniaxial/multiaxial ratcheting
responses. In parallel with the experimental studies (Aubin
et al., 2003; Delobelle et al., 1995; Park et al., 2007; Paul
1382 Kyong-Ho Chang et al. / International Journal of Steel Structures, 16(4), 1381-1396, 2016
et al., 2012; Portier et al., 2000), a variety of constitutive
models to simulate the cyclic plastic response quantitatively
and qualitatively have been developed (Bari and Hassan,
2000;Chaboche, 1986; Chaboche, 2008; Feigenbaum et
al., 2012; Kang and Kan, 2007; Lee et al., 2014b; Ohno
and Wang, 1993) most of which have generally been
confined to the materials level. For the structural ratcheting
responses of piping components, many attempts have
been made (Chen et al., 2013). Nevertheless, very few
studies so far have dealt with simulation of the plastic
response of a girth-welded piping component under cyclic
loading with non-zero mean stress.
This paper deals with ratcheting of a girth-welded
duplex stainless steel pipe subjected to uniaxial asymmetric
stress cycles through the numerical investigation, focusing
on investigating the relevance of the weld-induced residual
stresses to the cyclic behavior. Thermal simulation of the
girth butt welding process is first carried out to obtain the
residual stresses by using a sequentially coupled three-
dimensional (3-D) thermo-mechanical FE analysis method.
3-D elastic-plastic FE analysis to scrutinize the residual
stress effect on the progressive inelastic deformation of
the girth-welded steel pipe under the cyclic axial loading
is next conducted taking the residual stresses and plastic
strains into account. A cyclic plasticity model for simulating
the cyclic response is presented and incorporated into the
material constitutive equation in the FE analysis.
2. FE Thermal Simulation of the Girth
Welding Process
FE thermal simulation of the girth welding process
should first be performed to attain the weld-induced
residual stresses and plastic strains, which are required
input to the mechanical model for analyzing the effect
that the residual stresses have on the uniaxial ratcheting
response of the girth-welded duplex stainless steel pipe.
Welding process is basically a coupled thermo-mechanical
process. The thermal field has a strong influence on the
stress field, whilst the mechanical field weakly affects the
temperature distribution. Therefore, in this work, a
sequentially coupled 3-D thermal-mechanical FE analysis
based on the in-house FE-code (Lee, 2005) was carried
out to obtain the weld-induced residual stresses. The
analysis consists of two parts: a transient heat transfer
analysis followed by a transient stress analysis. The
thermal analysis identifies the temperature and phase
evolution as a function of time, and the mechanical
analysis takes the previous results to calculate displacements
at nodes and stresses at integration points. The following
subsections roughly describe the thermo-mechanical FE
analysis and the specific details can be found elsewhere
(Lee and Chang, 2014).
2.1. Thermal and mechanical analyses
Thermal analysis solves for the transient temperature
field and its history associated with the heat flow of
welding. During welding, the governing partial differential
equation for the 3-D transient heat conduction with
internal heat generation and considering ρ, K, and c as
functions of temperature only is given by the thermal
equilibrium equation.
∂ ∂T ∂ ∂T ∂ ∂T ∂T
----- ⎛ Kx ------⎞ + ----- ⎛ Ky ------⎞ + ----- ⎛ Kz ------⎞ + Q = ρc ------
(1)
∂x ⎝ ∂x ⎠ ∂y ⎝ ∂y ⎠ ∂z ⎝ ∂z ⎠ ∂t
The heat input to the work piece can be split into two
parts according to the nature of arc welding. One is the
heat of the welding arc, and the other is that of the melt
droplets. The heat of the welding arc is modeled by a
surface heat source with a Gaussian distribution, and that
of the melt droplets is modeled by a volumetric heat
source with uniform density. Heat flux distribution at the
surface of the work piece within r0 is defined by the
following equation:
3Q –( r ⁄ r )2
q ( r ) = --------2-1 e 0 (2)
πr0
where
Q1 = ηAV – Q2 (3)
In Eq. (3), η accounts for radiative and other losses
from the arc to the ambient environment. The heat from
the melt droplets is applied as a volumetric heat source
with a distributed heat flux (DFLUX) working on
individual elements in the fusion zone.
Q
DFLUX= ------2 (4)
Vp
where Vp can be obtained by calculating the volume
fraction of the elements in currently being welded zone.
The heat of the welding arc was assumed to be 40% of
the total heat input, and the heat of the melt droplets 60%
of the total heat input (Pardo and Weckman, 1989). η is
assumed as 0.7 for the gas tungsten arc (GTA) welding
process used in the present analysis. The heat flux is
applied during the time variation that corresponds to the
approach and passing of the welding torch. Temperature-
dependent thermo-physical properties of the material used
are incorporated along with the boundary conditions,
where radiation heat losses which are dominant in and
around the weld pool and convection heat losses which
are dominant away from the weld pool are both taken into
consideration and their combined effects are represented
by the temperature-dependent heat transfer coefficient, h
(Lee and Chang, 2014).
2 o
⎧ 0.0668T ( W ⁄ m C ) 0 < T < 500
h=⎨ (5)
o o
⎩ 0.231T – 82.1 ( W ⁄ m 2 C ) T > 500 C
In addition to the use of latent heat properties to
 Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe
describe heat effects relevant to the molten metal of the
weld pool, an artificially increased thermal conductivity,
which is three times larger than the value at room
temperature, is assumed for temperatures above the
melting point to allow for its convective stirring effect, as
suggested in (Deng and Murakawa, 2006). The latent heat
and melting temperature for duplex stainless steels are
500 J/Kg K and 1773 K, respectively (Del Coz Díaz et
al., 2010).
The subsequent mechanical analysis involves the use of
the temperature histories predicted by the previous
thermal model for each time increment as an input
(thermal loading) for the calculation of transient thermal
stresses and deformations. The temperature values obtained
at every time step when a weld metal deposition was
complete were employed in the mechanical analysis.
Each temperature step was split into optimized sub-steps
considering the state of the welding process and the
convergence. Two basic sets of equations relating to the
mechanical analysis, the equilibrium equation and the
constitutive equation, are as followings.
• equilibrium equation:
σij, j + ρbi = 0 (6)
where σ ij is symmetrical, i.e. σ ij=σ ji.
• constitutive equation:
During the welding process, solid-state phase trans-
formation is not considered because the metallurgical
phase transformation has little influence on the evolution
of welding residual stresses in duplex stainless steels (Del
Coz Díaz et al., 2010; Jin et al., 2004). Hence, addictive
strain decomposition is used to decompose the differential
form of the total strain into three components as follows:
· ·e ·p ·th
ε = ε +ε +ε (7)
The elastic strain increment is calculated using the
isotropic Hook’s law with temperature-dependent Young’s
modulus and Poisson’s ratio. The thermal strain increment
is computed using the coefficient of thermal expansion.
For the plastic strain increment, a rate-independent elastic-
plastic constitutive equation is considered with the Von
Mises yield criterion and temperature-dependent mechanical
properties. The linear isotropic hardening rule is adopted
here due to the lack of the material parameters at high
temperatures, even though the mixed isotropic-kinematic
hardening model could yield more accurate results (Jiang
et al., 2015; Muránsky et al., 2012). The incremental
form of stress-strain relation can be written as
· the pipe weld was determined from the reference (Sattari-
· ·
{σ } = [ Dd ] {ε } – { ct }T (8)
e
where [ Dd ] is divided into [ Dd ] for the elastic range and
p
[ Dd ] for the plastic range. Since the thermal elastic-
plastic analysis is a nonlinear problem, a full Newton-
Raphson iterative solution technique (Bathe, 1996) was
used for solving the problem. In the heat transfer and
1383
structural models, the process of sequential weld metal
deposition was controlled by using a consistent filler
activation/deactivation scheme (Lindgren, 2001).
2.2. Verification
In order to confirm the accuracy of the FE analysis
method adopted in this study, the experimental work by
Deng and Murakawa (2006) was simulated. They
measured the axial and hoop residual stresses in a girth-
welded austenitic stainless steel pipe (SUS304) by the
strain gage method. Moreover, the experimental investi-
gation by Um and Yoo (1997) in which the residual stress
distributions in a ferritic carbon steel pipe weld (KS
SPPS42) were examined by the hole-drilling method was
replicated due to the lack of the experimental data on the
residual stress distributions in a girth-welded duplex
(austenitic-ferritic) stainless steel pipe. The specific details
on the materials used and the preparation of the specimens
are given in elsewhere (Deng and Murakawa, 2006; Um
and Yoo, 1997). The experimental measurements were
compared with the corresponding numerical results. The
modeling procedure for the respective experiment is
similar to that given in the forthcoming section except for
the temperature-dependent thermal and mechanical properties
of the materials. The axial residual stresses calculated by
the FE simulation of the stainless steel pipe weld at those
locations where the circumferential angle from the welding
start/stop position is 180º on the inside surface with
respect to axial distance from the weld centerline are
shown in Fig. 1(a). On the other hand, Fig. 1(b) presents
the hoop residual stresses computed by the numerical
reproduction of the girth-welded ferritic carbon steel pipe
at those locations where the circumferential angle is 120º
on the inside surface. Superimposed, in the figures, are
the mean values of the residual stresses measured at the
locations of the respective pipe weld specimens. It can be
seen that the overall trends between the FE predictions
and the experimental results agree reasonably well. There-
fore, the FE analysis method used here can be considered
appropriate for analyzing the residual stresses in a girth-
welded duplex stainless steel pipe.
2.3. Model geometry
The FE analysis model geometry and dimensions are
illustrated in Fig. 2(a). Two 120 mm (outer diameter, D)
×120 mm (length, L)×6 mm (thickness, t) duplex stainless
steel pipes with a single V-groove joint between them
were assumed to be welded by single-pass. Thickness of
Far and Javadi, 2008). The welding torch travel direction
and the welding start/end position (θ =0º) are also depicted
in the figure. The welding conditions and process parameters
used were as follows: welding method, GTA welding
process; welding current, 230 A; welding voltage, 22 V;
and welding speed, 1.3 mm/s, respectively. In the present
investigation, the welding defect and damage were
1384 Kyong-Ho Chang et al. / International Journal of Steel Structures, 16(4), 1381-1396, 2016
Figure 1. Comparison of the FE result with the experiment.
assumed not to be generated during the welding process.
The 3-D FE mesh model with 8-noded isoparametric
solid elements is shown in Fig. 2(b). Due to the symmetry
conditions with respect to the weld centerline, one half of
the pipe geometry was chosen as the analysis model. In
the weld zone and its vicinity, a refined mesh is used to
simulate the high temperature and stress gradients, and a
relatively coarse mesh is adopted in the regions far away
from the girth weld to save computing time. Element size
increases with increasing the distance from the weld
centerline. A mesh convergence study was carried out to
examine the dependence of FE mesh size on the accuracy
of the analysis results. The smallest element size of 0.9
mm (axial)×1.5 mm (thickness)×12.1 mm (circumference)
was found as the best compromise between the model
accuracy and the computational time. The same FE mesh
refinement scheme between the thermal and mechanical
models is employed except for the element type and the
applied boundary conditions so as to expedite nodal data
mapping between them. The FE element type used in the
heat transfer model is the one which has single degree of
freedom, temperature, on its each node, while in the
structural model the element type is the other with three
translational degrees of freedom at each node. The
structural boundary conditions are prescribed for inhibiting
rigid body motion of the work piece. The detailed boundary
conditions adopted in the stress model are illustrated in
Fig. 2(b) by the arrows.
2.4. Material model
The base material selected for this investigation is
S32750 super duplex stainless steel which corresponds to
SAF 2507 (EN 1.4410). The chemical composition and
mechanical properties of the steel are tabulated in Table
1, and specific details on the material are presented in
(Iris, 2008). The physical constants such as density, specific
 Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe 1385

Figure 2. Model for analysis.

Table 1. Chemical composition and mechanical properties of S32750 super duplex stainless steel
Chemical composition (wt, %)
C Si Mn P S Cr Ni Cu Mo N
0.016 0.28 0.77 0.022 0.005 24.81 6.9 0.15 4.07 0.29
Mechanical properties
Young’s Modulus (GPa) Poisson’s ratio Yield stress (MPa) Ultimate strength (MPa) Elongation (%)
204 0.3 585.6 829.75 30

heat, heat transfer coefficient and thermal conductivity as
well as the mechanical properties such as yield stress,
Young’s modulus, Poisson’s ratio and thermal expansion
coefficient are dependent on temperature. Thus, temperature-
dependent thermo-physical and mechanical properties
were incorporated into the FE model and are seen in Fig.
3 (Lee and Chang, 2014). Note that in Fig. 3(b), both the
elastic modulus and the yield stress are reduced to 5.0
GPa and 5.0 MPa, respectively, at the melting temperature
to simulate low strength at high temperatures (Barsoum,
2008). Autogenous weldment was assumed for the pipe
weld, i.e. the weld metal, the heat affected zone (HAZ)
1386 Kyong-Ho Chang et al. / International Journal of Steel Structures, 16(4), 1381-1396, 2016
Figure 3. Temperature-dependent thermo-physical and mechanical properties of the material.
and the base metal share the same thermal and mechanical
properties (Teng et al., 2003). The work hardening
induced by the thermal cycles during welding in the weld
area and its vicinity was also taken into account. In this
study, temperature-dependent strain hardening rate was
used (Lee and Chang, 2014).
2.5. Results and discussion
Results are first prepared for the residual stresses
induced by the girth butt welding. Four sections which
have different circumferential angles from the weld start/
end position, θ, are selected to represent the residual stress
distributions along the circumference. Figure 4(a) and
4(b) show the axial residual stress distributions at the four
locations on the inside surface and the outside surface,
respectively with respect to axial distance from the weld
centerline. Bending axial stress distribution through the
thickness can be observed in the weld and its vicinity, i.e.
the axial residual stresses are compressive on the outside
surface and tensile on the inside surface along the
perimeter. This is because the circumferential shrinkage
during the girth welding process leads to a local inward
deformation near the weld region, resulting in compressive
axial residual stresses on the outside surface. Tensile axial
residual stresses are generated on the inside surface due
to self-equilibration. The tensile axial stresses level out in
compression far away from the weld area and vice versa
on the outside surface. It should be recognized that the
axial residual stresses are sensitive to the circumference.
This is attributed to the fact that the sequential addition of
the weld filler as the welding arc travels along the girth
renders the internal restraint change spatially. The biggest
variation occurs at the overlapping region (θ =0º). Figure
5(a) and 5(b) portray the hoop residual stresses at the four
positions on the inside surface and the outside surface,
respectively. Regarding the hoop residual stresses, their
magnitude is influenced by the axial residual stresses.
This explains why the hoop residual stresses on the inside
surface, which is undergoing axial tension, are more
tensile at the weld area and its periphery compared to
 Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe 1387

Figure 4. Axial residual stresses at locations with different circumferential angle θ.

those on the outside surface. In addition, careful observation the state of stress for which plasticity will occur. The
of the results reveals that spatial variations of the stress yield surface is represented by
distributions are present along the circumference. A
1⁄2
remarkable change of the residual stresses is also seen at 3
f ( σ – α ) = --- ( σ' – α' ) ⋅ ( σ' – α' ) – R – k∗ = 0 (9)
the welding start/end position. 2

3. Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of the
Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe
3.1. Cyclic plasticity constitutive model
The cyclic constitutive model is based on the isotropic
linear elasticity with the generalized Hooke’s law, a von
Mises yield criterion, the associated plastic flow rule and
the hardening rule. The rate-independent cyclic plasticity
constitutive model which assumes cyclic hardening material
behavior and J 2-type plasticity is considered and has the
following common attributes:
(i) von Mises yield criterion: the yield criterion specifies
The dot “ · ” implies the inner product at a · b=aijbij.
(ii) Flow rule: the total strain increment is additively
decomposed into the elastic and plastic strain increment.
The incremental stress-plastic strain relation is given by
·p · ∂f 1 · ∂f
ε = λ ------ = ---- 〈 σ' :n〉n , n = 2--- ------ (10)
∂σ H 3 ∂σ
where < > represents the MacCauley bracket
(iii) Hardening rule: the hardening rule dictates the
yield surface change in stress space during plastic loading.
Generally, the yield surface can vary in size (the yield
1388 Kyong-Ho Chang et al. / International Journal of Steel Structures, 16(4), 1381-1396, 2016

Figure 5. Hoop residual stresses at locations with different circumferential angle θ.

surface expansion by isotropic hardening), shape (the
yield surface distortion) and/or center location (the yield
surface translation by kinematic hardening) due to plastic
deformation. In this work, the evolution of the yield
surface with plastic loading increments is accommodated
by considering the isotropic and the kinematic hardening
rule. For the kinematic hardening rule, the decomposed
nonlinear kinematic hardening equation proposed by the
authors (Lee et al., 2014b) is employed and incorporated
into the cyclic plasticity model, which is expressed as

l l
⎧ 2 ·p αk' m
·⎫
∑ γk⎨⎩ --3- ckεij – ⎛⎝ -----
-⎞
· ·
αij' = ∑ (αij' )k = ck ⎠
[ ϕ ( αij' )k + ( 1 – ϕ ) ( ( αrs' )k :nrs )nij ]p ⎬
⎭
(11)
k=1 k=1

For the isotropic hardening rule, the following equation

–µq
is adopted (Lee et al., 2014b). Qc = Qs [ 1 – e ] (13)
–bp
R = Qc ( 1 – e ) (12) The cyclic constitutive model has three decomposed
kinematic hardening rules (n=3), i.e. the number of the
The plastic strain path dependence is also considered in back stress components is three (Bari and Hassan, 2000).
the cyclic plasticity model by the following equation (Lee Hence, the performance of the cyclic model requires a
et al., 2014b): total number of twelve material parameters, i.e. the
 Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe 1389

Table 2. Model parameters for the material

m ϕ c1 (MPa) c2 (MPa) c3 (MPa) γ1
0.85 0.3 157.5 100.0 5.373 600.0
γ2 γ3 Qs (MPa) μ b k* (MPa)
100.6 7.404 579.6 17.42 23.73 500.0

Figure 6. Configuration of the test specimen (unit: mm).

Figure 7. Loading histories.

material parameter k*, the material constants of c 1, c 2, c 3,
γ 1, γ 2, γ 3, m, ϕ for calculating the kinematic hardening
rate and those of Qs, μ, b for computing the isotropic
hardening rule are needed to simulate the cyclic response.
The parameter k* is determined from the linear part of the
stabilized uniaxial stress-strain hysteresis curve. To determine
the kinematic hardening parameters describing ratcheting
phenomena, uniaxial test data of the stable stress-strain
hysteresis loop with pure kinematic hardening are required.
Assuming that the cyclic hardening is only induced by
isotropic hardening, the isotropic hardening evolution
with regard to accumulated plastic strain under the strain-
controlled symmetric cyclic loading test with certain strain
amplitude can be gained. The effect of isotropic hardening
on the uniaxial stabilized stress-strain hysteresis loop in
which both isotropic and kinematic hardening are mixed
can be excluded by using the isotropic hardening evolution
function. Then, the kinematic hardening parameters c 1,
c 2, c 3, and γ 1, γ 2, γ 3 are acquired in accordance with the
procedures specified in (Bari and Hassan, 2000). The
material constants Qs, μ, and b can also be obtained from
the isotropic hardening evolution curve (Do, 2013). The
1390 Kyong-Ho Chang et al. / International Journal of Steel Structures, 16(4), 1381-1396, 2016
Figure 8. Comparison of the cyclic strain-stress curves for the strain-controlled symmetric cycling with changing strain
amplitude.
additional kinematic hardening parameters m and ϕ are
identified from the ratcheting experiments by the trial and
error method (Do, 2013). All the constitutive model
parameters for the base material subjected to the strain
amplitude of 1.0% are presented in Table 2.
3.2. Verification
In order to confirm the validity of the cyclic constitutive
model, the cyclic loading tests of S32750 super duplex
stainless steel were simulated using the FE analysis technique
for direct comparisons of the analytical predictions with
the test data. The hot-rolled plate of the material was
machined to be solid round bar specimen for the uniaxial
cyclic loading tests. The geometry and dimensions of the
test specimen is illustrated in Fig. 6. The uniaxial tests
were conducted using a MTS809-250KN servo-hydraulic
testing machine equipped with a computerized data
acquisition system. An extensometer with 12.5 mm gage
length was used to measure the strain. The specimens
were tested under uniaxial strain cycling and uniaxial stress
cycling, respectively. Strain rate of the strain-controlled
cycling was 1×10−3/s and stress rate of the stress-controlled
cycling was 30 MPa/s. Figure 7 shows the cyclic loading
histories of the experimental set. The history in Fig. 7(a)
involves strain-controlled symmetric cycles in which the
axial strain amplitude εa ranges from 0.6 to 1.0%. The
history in Fig. 7(b), which results in axial strain ratcheting,
involves axial stress cycles with a non-zero mean stress.
Three specimens were tested at each examination. Figure
8 compares the simulated and the measured hysteresis
loops for the fully symmetric strain-controlled cycling
applied in the form of step loading. In the step loading
test, the strain amplitude varies in ascending order of 0.6,
0.8, and 1.0%. For the respective strain level, cyclic loading
 Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe 1391

Figure 9. Uniaxial Ratcheting response under the asymmetric uniaxial stress cycling with a mean stress of 75 MPa and
a stress amplitude of 636 MPa.

is continued until the stress-strain curve is closed and
achieves saturation, and then the strain amplitude is changed
to a higher level. The overall loci of the simulated results
are in good agreements (within 5%) with those of the
tests and the cyclic constitutive model accurately duplicate
the cyclic hardening behavior and the plastic strain path
dependence. Comparison is next made between the
experimental measurement on the uniaxial ratcheting
response under the asymmetric stress-controlled cyclic
loading with a mean stress of 75 MPa and a stress
amplitude of 636 MPa and the analytical prediction
computed by the cyclic constitutive model in Fig. 9. The
mean stress and the stress amplitude were determined
such that the sum of the loading parameters fully
exceeded the elastic limit and did not exceed the tensile
strength. The comparisons reveal that the correspondence
between the experimental and the analytical results is
reasonably good (within 7%). Hence, the cyclic plasticity
constitutive model is considered suitable for describing
the uniaxial ratcheting behavior of the girth-welded steel
pipe.
3.3. 3-D FE analysis model
After obtaining the weld-induced residual stresses by
the FE thermal simulation, 3-D elastic-plastic FE analyses
were carried out to explore the ratcheting responses of the
girth-welded duplex stainless steel pipe submitted to uniaxial
asymmetric stress cycling through the in-house FE-code
(Do, 2013; Lee, 2005) by incorporating the cyclic plasticity
model into the material constitutive equation. The radial
return method introduced by Simo and Taylor (1985) was
used to numerically solve the equations in the cyclic
1392 Kyong-Ho Chang et al. / International Journal of Steel Structures, 16(4), 1381-1396, 2016
Figure 10. Cyclic strain-stress curves of the pipe model under the asymmetric uniaxial stress cycling with a mean stress
of 40 MPa and a stress amplitude of 636 MPa.
constitutive model. The same FE mesh density as the
thermal stress model, with different loading and boundary
conditions, was employed to facilitate the structural data
mapping between them. 3-D eight-noded isoparametric
brick elements with three translational degrees of freedom
at each node were used to discretize the computation
domain. The axial and hoop residual stresses and plastic
strains of magnitudes and distributions as obtained by the
FE simulation of the girth butt welding process were
introduced as an initial condition into FE the model.
Then, stress-controlled cycling in the presence of non-
zero mean stress was applied on the loading edge of the
girth-welded pipe model (Fig. 2(b)) along the axial
direction as a distributed load. Two loading types were
considered, i.e. uniaxial stress cycling with different stress
amplitude under constant mean stress and vice versa. The
stress amplitude levels considered were 600, 636, and
666 MPa and the mean stress adopted were 20, 40, and
60 MPa. The boundary conditions were such that all
nodes at the loaded edge of the FE model were only free
to translate in the axial direction to allow for application
of the asymmetric stress cycles and were constrained to
move together in loading direction. As indicated earlier,
autogenous weldment was postulated during the girth
welding. Therefore, the cyclic stress-strain relations for
the base material can be used to capture the uniaxial
ratcheting response of the girth-welded stainless steel
pipe. The mechanical properties at room temperature
presented in Fig. 3(b) were used for the FE analyses. The
uniaxial ratcheting responses of the pipe model without
considering the weld-induced residual stresses were also
simulated for the comparison by which the contribution
degree of the residual stresses to the uniaxial ratcheting
behavior was identified.
 Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe 1393

Figure 11. Comparison of the uniaxial ratcheting strains with respect to the number of cycles of the pipe model with and
without considering welding residual stresses under the asymmetric stress cycling.

Figure 12. Comparisons of the uniaxial ratcheting strains with respect to the number of cycles of the pipe model with
and without considering welding residual stresses for the asymmetric stress cycling with different stress amplitude under
constant mean stress.

4. Results and Discussion
Figure 10 compares the simulated cyclic strain-stress curves
of the stainless steel pipe with and without considering
welding residual stresses for the asymmetric uniaxial
stress cycling with a mean stress of 40 MPa and a stress
amplitude of 636 MPa. Figure 11 shows the evolution of
the uniaxial ratcheting strain with respect to the number
of cycles of the pipe model with and without considering
welding residual stresses under the asymmetric stress
cycles. The ratcheting strain is determined from the mean
value of the two peak strains of every cycle. Referring to
the results, it is apparent that the cyclic behavior is affected
by the residual stresses to some extent. In general, under
cyclic loading, welding residual stresses tend to relax to
some degree after a certain number of cycles and become
stabilized. The magnitude of the residual stress relaxation
is mainly dependent on the stress amplitude applied (Lee
et al., 2015). In the present investigation, the residual
stresses are not completely released during the mechanical
cyclic loading. The premature yielding of the pipe cross-
section caused by the initial residual stresses and the
relaxed residual stresses together with the applied cyclic
load promote the ratcheting strain as compared to the pipe
specimen with no girth weld.
Figure 12 depicts the predicted uniaxial ratcheting strains
with respect to the number of cycles of the pipe model
with and without considering welding residual stresses
for the asymmetric stress cycling with different stress
amplitude under constant mean stress of 40 MPa. It is
seen that at constant mean stress, the axial strain and its
rate increase, whilst the residual stress effect becomes
1394 Kyong-Ho Chang et al. / International Journal of Steel Structures, 16(4), 1381-1396, 2016
Figure 13. Comparisons of the uniaxial ratcheting strains with respect to the number of cycles of the pipe model with
and without considering welding residual stresses for the asymmetric stress cycling with different mean stress under
constant stress amplitude.
smaller as the stress amplitude increases. This is due to
the fact that the more the stress amplitude increases, the
more the residual stresses are relieved. Figure 13 portrays
the uniaxial ratcheting strains with respect to the number
of cycles of the pipe model with and without considering
welding residual stresses for the asymmetric stress cycling
with different mean stress under constant stress amplitude
of 636 MPa. It can be observed that at constant stress
amplitude, the axial strain accumulation increases and the
residual stress effect becomes larger as the magnitude of
mean stress increases. The higher the tensile mean stress
becomes, the higher the residual stresses become due to
the superposition (Lee and Chang, 2007).
5. Conclusions
This study aimed at exploring the ratcheting behavior
of a girth-welded stainless steel pipe exposed to uniaxial
stress cycling in the presence of means stress and focused
on characterizing the correlation of welding residual
stresses to the cyclic behavior. The girth welding process
was first simulated to identify the weld-induced residual
stresses by using a sequentially coupled 3-D thermo-
mechanical FE analysis method. A cyclic plasticity cons-
titutive model capable of describing the cyclic response
was next presented and incorporated into the 3-D elastic-
plastic FE analysis to scrutinize the effects of the residual
stresses on the cyclic inelastic deformation of the girth-
welded steel pipe under the asymmetric stress cycles. The
residual stresses and plastic strains obtained from the
preceding thermal simulation were taken as the pre-stress
condition for the analysis. Two different cyclic loading
types were applied to assess the influence that the residual
stresses had on the uniaxial ratcheting strain. Based on
the results in this work, the following conclusions can be
drawn.
(1) Weld-induced residual stresses lead to an increase
in the uniaxial ratcheting strain and hence they are needed
to be taken into account in a correct evaluation of the
uniaxial ratcheting behavior of the girth-welded steel
pipe.
(2) At constant mean stress, the axial strain and its rate
increase, whilst the residual stress effect becomes smaller
as the stress amplitude increases. At constant stress amplitude,
the axial strain and its rate increase and the residual stress
effect becomes larger as the magnitude of mean stress
increases.
(3) Accurate estimation of the residual stress effect on
the uniaxial ratcheting response by the FE analysis
method devised here can be helpful to understand the
ratcheting-fatigue failure mechanism of a girth-welded
steel pipe.
Acknowledgments
This research was supported by Mid-career Researcher
Program through the National Research Foundation of
Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Science, ICT &
Future Planning (NRF-2015R1A2A2A01006390).
Nomenclature
b : material constant
bi : body force
c : specific heat
ct : parameter to reflect stress increment due to the
dependence of the physical and mechanical
material properties on temperature
ck : material constant
f : yield function
k* : initial size of yield surface
m : material constant
n : unit normal vector
 Effects of Residual Stresses on the Uniaxial Ratcheting Behavior of a Girth-welded Stainless Steel Pipe 1395

p : accumulated plastic strain Hall.

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