Direct Laboratory Funded Program -Reliability Criteria for Advanced Structural Materials/Fast Craft and Ships.

摘要

This report summarizes the accomplishments of a three-year program to explore the materials aspects of structural integrity technology for fast craft and ships. Fast craft and ships of the future will be the first Navy experience with fleet ships where high-strength materials will be used in the seawater environment. In contrast to the customary naval structural materials, which are quite 'forgiving', higher strength materials have an increased tendency for accelerated crack growth, environmental effects, and fracture; the result of this tendency will be increased safety and maintenance deficiencies in critical components until sufficient technology and experience in the correct use of such materials is gained. In the three-year program, the properties of current candidate structural materials and promising developmental materials were investigated, using general fracture mechanics methods, to evolve the technology necessary for their safe and economical use in the design of future ships. The emphasis of the program was on fracture, fatigue crack growth, and stress-corrosion cracking of metals in thin-section sizes; an additional part of the program concerned similar studies of high-strength composite materials and adhesive bonding.