Residual Stress Measurement refers to stresses which are ‘locked in’ to a component, and can affect the behaviour of a component in service. Tensile residual stresses are sometimes present as a result of manufacturing processes and can have a negative effect on the fatigue life of a part in service. Shot Peening is a proven method for inducing compressive residual stresses in a component which can significantly increase the life of the component in service.
Sandwell is one of the few companies in the UK outside of Universities that has its own in house equipment for residual stress measurement. We have a state of the art electronic speckle pattern interferometry (ESPI) capable of measuring subsurface stress profiles in most materials.