This thesis is concerned with estimation of parameters involved in a residual strength degradation model and S-N curve in composite materials. This model has been derived based on the assumption that the residual strength decreases monotonically.
Under the assumption of residual strength degradation model and Weibull or lognormally distributed static strength, fatigue life distributions and residual strength distributions are derived. When static strength data, fatigue failure data and censored life data with residual strength exist, a procedure for finding maximum likelihood estimators of the parameters is suggested and compared with other methods based upon mean square error through simulation studies.
