Simulations of the effect of shot peening backstress on nanoindentation

Shot peening is a mechanical surface treatment that can introduce compressive residual stress and work hardening simultaneously. This work hardening, considered as a modification of the elastic region with plastic strain, can be modelled with two types of contributions: isotropic hardening and kinematic hardening. In order to characterize the mechanical properties of the treated surface using the instrumented indentation technique, the effect of the backstress associated with kinematic hardening should be studied, especially for works related to fatigue loading. In this paper, the distribution of three backstress components is obtained by shot peening simulations on a nickel-based alloy, Inconel 718, commonly used in the aerospace industry, and a series of indentation simulations are carried out using a spherical tip with different equivalent backstress levels. For Inconel 718, the third backstress component, which has the slowest evolution rate, is found to have the most significant influence on the response. However, compared to the effect of residual stress and cumulated plastic strain, the effect of backstress can be neglected.