AUTOMATED FRACTAL ANALYSIS OF A NETWORK OF THERMAL FATIGUE CRACKS AVTOMATI^NA FRAKTALNA ANALIZA MRE@E RAZPOK ZARADI TERMI^NE UTRUJENOSTI

We have studied continuous-casting machine rolls’ surface thermal cracking images. On the fundamentals of fractals a thermal cracking procedure analysis was proposed. The achieved results show that the thermal cracks have a strong self-similarity, according to the fractal laws, and the values of the fractal dimensions range from 1.0 to 2.0. The relationship between the fractal dimensions and the distribution values of the cracks’ lengths is established. A new method of diagnostics and certain ideas for the analysis of the thermal cracking of a continuous casting machine roll with fractals theory is proposed.