Abstract
The paper presents a new rolling contact fatigue test for rolling bearing materials. Contact fatigue tests of were conducted by using a four-roller testing machine. The specimen rollers were made of case hardening, through hardening, and high frequency hardening steels. To detect and record the rolling contact microcracks without destroying the specimen, a special kind of non-symmetrical ring was used for the specimen. The distribution of the fatigue cracks in the depth of the superficial layer is similar to equivalent stresses in rolling contact including the effect of the applied treatment. Since the fatigue cracks starting at inclusions induced the fatigue failure the cumulated probability was considered as damage accumulation. It was found that the power regression is the best approximation for the majority of specimens, and speed of damage accumulation and susceptibility at cracking initiation were correlated with the life of the specimens. The observed correlation can be used to estimate fatigue life for materials from rolling bearings, gears and cams are made of.