This book provides a detailed review and summary of twenty-two case studies of fracture and fatigue in bridge structures. Its two parts cover cracks formed as a result of low fatigue resistant details, and cracks resulting from unanticipated secondary or displacement induced stresses.

"This book emphasizes the physical and practical aspects of fatigue and fracture. It covers mechanical properties of materials, differences between ductile and brittle fractures, fracture mechanics, the basics of fatigue, structural joints, high temperature failures, wear, environmentally-induced failures, and steps in the failure analysis process."--publishers website.

Many old riveted railway bridges are replaced too soon due to a general lack of knowledge about the expected life span. This indicates the need for more information on fatigue and brittle fracture of riveted bridges. This book unveils extensive research and literature results on riveted bridges' fatigue live and shows how to take fatigue properly i

Fracture, fatigue, and other subcritical processes, such as creep crack growth or stress corrosion cracking, present numerous open issues from both scientific and industrial points of view. These phenomena are of special interest in industrial and civil metallic structures, such as pipes, vessels, machinery, aircrafts, ship hulls, and bridges, given that their failure may imply catastrophic consequences for human life, the natural environment, and/or the economy. Moreover, an adequate management of their operational life, defining suitable inspection periods, repairs, or replacements, requires their safety or unsafety conditions to be defined. The analysis of these technological challenges requires accurate comprehensive assessment tools based on solid theoretical foundations as well as structural integrity assessment standards or procedures incorporating such tools into industrial practice.

This report contains nine specific-application cases of various nondestructive test (NDT) methods in fatigue and fracture reliability assessment of structures.

This book addresses the fatigue behavior of riveted connections from ancient Portuguese metallic bridges as well as the fatigue crack propagation behavior of related materials. Some examples of the fatigue assessment of long-term operated metallic bridges are presented and discussed. The phenomena of degradation is discussed in chapter 2, devoted to the material aspects of the Degradation Theory. Applications of structural integrity assessment/ corrosion aspects are discussed in chapter 3; case studies in chapter 4 and fatigue and fracture test results in chapter 5.

This volume addresses the specific subject of fatigue, a subject not familiar to many engineers, but still relevant for proper and good design of numerous steel structures. It explains all issues related to the subject: Basis of fatigue design, reliability and various verification formats, determination of stresses and stress ranges, fatigue strength, application range and limitations. It contains detailed examples of applications of the concepts, computation methods and verifications.