Patent Document ID: 20060206295
Application ID: 11335021
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. An apparatus for predicting the failure of a component comprising: a central processing unit (CPU); an output device for displaying simulated fatigue results; an input device for receiving input; and a memory comprising: instructions for receiving input comprising: a component's material characteristics, a Finite Element Model of said component, and at least one Representative Volume Element (RVE) microstructure-based failure model; instructions for predicting failure of said component comprising: analyzing said FEM to obtain stresses at nodes of said FEM; identifying a subset of said nodes as significant nodes based on said stresses; determining an RVE for at least one of said significant nodes; simulating a component using at least one RVE microstructure-based failure model, said simulating producing a result related to component life; performing said simulating a plurality of times to produce results related to component life; preparing statistics using said results; and comparing said statistics to a probability of failure (POF) criteria to determine whether said performing predicted failure for said component; and instructions for displaying a result from said predicting.