Application of master curve method to the evaluation of fracture toughness of F82H steels

Fracture toughness data was obtained for reduced-activation ferritic (RAF) steels with different sizes of specimens (1 compact tension(CT), 1/2 CT and 1/4 CT) using the master curve (MC) method in the transition temperature region. Considering the size adjustment by ASTM E1921, effects of specimen size on the fracture toughness are not observed and the reference temperature (T0) is around 164 K which is similar to those (154 K) of other previous studies. However, the data are not well represented by a MC, showing a rather large number of data below the lower boundary curve. Our proposed new MC was derived within the framework of the ASTM E1921 standard to apply the MC method to F82H steel. This new MC analysis can be applied to RAF steels to estimate T0 with a better description of the data scatter in the transition temperature region of fracture toughness than that of the conventional MC analysis