Fatigue Life Improvement of Laser Clad 7075 Aluminium Alloy by Deep Surface Rolling Technique

The Deep Surface Rolling (DSR) technology can substantially increase the fatigue life of metallic materials due to the introduction of deep compressive residual stresses in the material surface. These beneficial compressive residual stresses can be achieved up to a depth of 1 mm. The DSR technology also produces a good surface finish unlike bead peening technology. In this study, the main objectives were: (1) to study the feasibility of DSR for fatigue life improvement of high strength aluminium alloy (7075-T651) repaired with laser cladding technology, and (2) to investigate the effect of thermal stressing on the fatigue life improvement of DSR. Previously published results have shown that post-heat treatment of laser clad high strength Al alloy coupons improved their fatigue life. The experimental results in this paper show that the fatigue life was substantially increased using the DSR technique on laser clad 7075-T6 aluminium alloy compared to laser cladding alone and laser cladding followed by post heat treatment.