Thermal residual stresses in functionally graded structures: A didactic case study

Manufacturing processes which involve plastic deformations or abrupt temperature gradients often leads thermal residual stresses to arise on materials. This fact can thus result in stress states that remain within a structural member in the absence of external loads, being desirable to obtain, as long as possible, a minimum level of residual stresses as well as smoother stresses transitions in the materials interfaces. Dual-phase functionally graded materials can be used with the purpose to mitigate stress concentrations by gradually varying the microstructure and/or composition of materials in a gradient structure. The current work presents part of a remote educational platform developed to promote and motivate mechanical engineering students to gain a broader insight of a common drawback in mechanical design. Here MATLAB and LabVIEW are used to set up an integrated tool for engineering education and research, by taking as demonstration the problem of thermal residual stresses in functionally graded structures. The educational platform empowers students to understand the influence, on thermal residual stresses, of different design parameters. This pilot project is entering on its implementation phase, wherein students are required to explore the multiple potentialities of this platform to support their learning process.