Numerical and experimental identification of fatigue crack initiation sites in clinched joints Ewenz, L. Bielak, Christian Roman Otroshi, Mortaza Bobbert, Mathias Meschut, Gerson Zimmermann, M. Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering Mechanical Engineering In this paper, a study based on experimental and numerical simulations is performed to analyze fatigue cracks in clinched joints. An experimental investigation is conducted to determine the failure modes of clinched joints under cyclic loading at different load amplitudes with single-lap shear tests. In addition, numerical FEM simulations of clinching process and subsequent shear loading are performed to support the experimental investigations by analyzing the state of stresses at the location of failure. An attempt is made to explain the location of crack initiation in the experiments using evaluation variables such as contact shear stress and maximum principal stress. Springer Science and Business Media LLC 2022 info:eu-repo/semantics/article doc-type:article text http://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_6501 https://ris.uni-paderborn.de/record/34213 Ewenz L, Bielak CR, Otroshi M, Bobbert M, Meschut G, Zimmermann M. Numerical and experimental identification of fatigue crack initiation sites in clinched joints. <i>Production Engineering</i>. 2022;16(2-3):305-313. doi:<a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s11740-022-01124-z">10.1007/s11740-022-01124-z</a> eng info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/doi/10.1007/s11740-022-01124-z info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/issn/0944-6524 info:eu-repo/semantics/altIdentifier/issn/1863-7353 info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/418701707 info:eu-repo/semantics/closedAccess