The Effects of Shot Peening Highly Loaded Compression Springs

Author:  Chris Swope, Dave Breuer, Mike Brauss
Source:  ICSP-13
Doc ID:  2017034
Year of Publication:  2017
Abstract:  
Introduction: For severe duty spring applications the designer has to achieve additional gains once the material and geometry have been selected, particularly if the application has weight and space restraints. The compression spring in this test study is typical of one used in a demanding off-road vehicle suspension. The cyclic loads applied during fatigue tests were high enough to cause failure in approximately 11,000 cycles without shot peening. For most fatigue applications, this would be considered low cycle (high stress) and not well suited for shot peening which is usually applied in high cycle (low stress) loading. This study will demonstrate that various peening treatments produced excellent fatigue life improvement.