Hardening effect and fatigue behavior enhancement through ball burnishing on AISI 1038

The objective of this paper is to present a comprehensive study of the effects of ball burnishing on the low cycle fatigue endurance of cylindrical specimens subjected to alternative bending stress, by constructing fatigue S-N curves to evaluate the impact of the process on the general fatigue behavior of AISI 1038. The specimens were burnished through five different force-number of passes couples, displacing the as-machined-material S-N curve towards higher lifespans as the degree of cold work is increased, either by effect of a higher force and more burnishing passes. The derived surface hardening effect also proved to be correlated analytically with the fatigue lifespan increase at all tested maximum-stress levels, as prove the correlation of the parameters that represent the potential equation associated to the Wöhler model with the hardening effect. It is concluded that the process performed with 120 N and 7 passes results in the most favorable results, represented by a 41% increase of hardness and a 77% increase in the lifespan in the best of cases.