Abstract
Isothermal and thermal-mechanical fatigue characteristics of 12Cr heat resisting steel used for high temperature applications were investigated including hold time effects. Isothermal low cycle fatigue test at $600^{\circ}C$ and in-phase, out-of-phase thermal-mechanical fatigue test at 350 to $600^{\circ}C$ were conducted using smooth cylindrical hollow specimen under strain-control with total strain ranges from 0.006 to 0.015. Regardless of thermal-mechanical and isothermal fatigue tests, cyclic softening behavior was observed and much more pronounced in the thermal-mechanical fatigue tests with hold times due to the stress relaxation during the hold time. The phase difference between temperature and strain in thermal-mechanical fatigue tests resulted in significantly shorter fatigue life for out-of-phase compared to in-phase. The differences in fatigue lives were dependent upon the magnitudes of plastic strain ranges and mean stresses. During the hold time in the strain-controlled fatigue tests, the increase in the plastic strain range and the stress relaxation were observed. It appeared that the increase in plastic strain range per cycle and the introduction of creep damage made important contributions to the reduction of thermal-mechanical fatigue life with hold time, and the life reduction tendency was more remarkable in the in-phase than in the out-of-phase thermal-mechanical fatigue. Isothermal fatigue tests performed under the combination of fast and slow strain rates at $600^{\circ}C$ showed that the fatigue life decreased as the strain rate and frequency decreased,especially for the low strain ranges.