RELIABILITY APPROACH TO FRACTURE ASSESSMENT FOR DEFECTS IN WELDED JOINTS

A probabilistic method for the assessment of defects in welded joints in marine structures under wave loads is given. The probability characteristics of the fracture driving parameter caused by the randomness of the wave loads was taken as a random variable. It is assumed that the long term distribution of the wave loads is the exponential distribution and wave loads occur independently of the appearance sequence. The variation of the fracture stress limit with the growth of crack size and the exceeding probability of the required fracture stress were considered in the formulation of the reliability analysis. The numerical results are discussed.