Evolution of a laser shock peened residual stress field locally with foreign object damage and subsequent fatigue crack growth

Foreign object damage (FOD) can seriously shorten the fatigue lives of components. On the other hand, laser shock peening improves fatigue life by introducing deep compressive residual stress into components. In this paper we examine how the non-uniform steep residual stress profile arising from FOD of laser peened aerofoil leading edges varies as a function of fatigue crack growth under high cycle fatigue and mixed high and low cycle fatigue conditions. The ballistic FOD impacts were introduced by impacting a cube edge head-on (at an angle of 0°) to the leading edge. The residual stress distributions have been mapped by synchrotron X-ray diffraction prior to cracking and subsequent to short (∼1 mm) and long (up to 6 mm) crack growth. The results suggest that the local residual stress field is highly stable even to the growth of relatively long cracks.