Very high cycle fatigue properties of short glass fiber reinforced polyetheretherketone (PEEK)

• Glass fiber reinforced PEEK does not show a fatigue limit below 10 9 cycles. • Glass fiber reinforcement improves fatigue strength of PEEK by a factor of about two. • Intermittent ultrasonic fatigue testing avoids excessive specimen heating. • Slope exponents of S-N curves measured at 10 – 20 Hz and 19 kHz are comparable. • Ultrasonic S–N curve is insignificantly shifted to lower stress amplitudes. The fatigue properties of 14 wt-% short glass fiber reinforced polyetheretherketone (PEEK–GF14) have been investigated in the high and very high cycle fatigue (VHCF) regime. Experiments were performed at a load ratio of –1 with servohydraulic and electrodynamic equipment at cycling frequency 10–20 Hz, and with ultrasonic equipment at 19 kHz. A new specimen geometry has been developed that allows ultrasonic tests up to high stress amplitudes. The same specimen shape was used in both testing series to exclude size effects, which enabled to focus on the influence of cycling frequency and testing technique. Ultrasonic fatigue testing with intermittent loading served to avoid heating of specimens. The S-N curves measured at 10–20 Hz and 19 kHz show a similar slope exponent (i.e., 10 % deviation). Mean S-N curve determined with ultrasonic equipment is shifted to slightly lower stress amplitudes, which may be attributed to statistical scatter. PEEK–GF14 does not show a fatigue limit and failures still occurred above 10 9 cycles. The VHCF strength of PEEK-GF14 is approximately two times higher compared with unreinforced PEEK. Fractographic investigations revealed fiber fracture and, less frequently, fiber pull-out.