Experimental setup for testing thermo-mechanical fatigue of single crystal turbine blades

An experimental system including 5 subsystems: the loading, heating, air cooling, water cooling and control subsystems, was constructed to satisfy the requirements of thermo-mechanical fatigue (TMF) experiments of single crystal hollow turbine blades. The TMF experimental system provided evidences that the stress distribution, temperature distribution, air cooling and stress/temperature spectrum on critical section of turbine blades under service conditions could be simulated simultaneously in a laboratory environment. And the TMF experiments were performed on the critical section. The results of the TMF experiments reproduced the failure model of the turbine blades. Based on these results, life prediction and failure analysis could be investigated.