The special application environment puts forward the higher requirement of reliability of parts made from titanium alloy Ti–6Al–4V, which is closely related to the machining-induced residual stress. For the fact of the non-linear distribution of residual stress beneath the machined surface, distribution of peripheral milling-induced residual stress and its effect on fatigue performance of titanium alloy Ti–6Al–4V are still confusing. In the present study, residual stress profile induced by peripheral milling of Ti–6Al–4V is first studied. And then, energy criteria are proposed to characterise the whole state of the residual stress field. Finally, the effects of residual stress profile and surface energy on tensile–tensile fatigue performance of titanium alloy Ti–6Al–4V are discussed. The conclusions were drawn that the variation trend of surface residual stress (σr,Sur), maximum compressive residual stress (σC,ax), location (hr0) and response depth (hry) of residual stress profile with cutting parameters showed a similar pattern for both measure directions those parallel (σ1) and perpendicular (σ3) to the cutting direction. Cutting speed and feed rate have a main effect on surface residual stress, and the depth of cut has little effect on all the four key factors of residual stress profile. With the increase of cutting speed and feed rate, machining-induced surface energy tends to become larger. But increasing the depth of cut caused the strain energy stored in unit time to decrease. Furthermore, the effect of depth of cut on surface energy was weakened when the value of cutting depth becomes larger. Both the surface compressive residual stress and the maximum compressive residual stress are beneficial for prolonging the fatigue life, while large value of machining-induced surface energy leads to a decrease of fatigue life. Analysis of variance result shows that maximum residual compressive stress has a greater impact on fatigue life than other residual stress factors.

Machining-induced surface integrity has an important effect on reliability and service life of the components used in the aerospace industry where titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V is widely applied. Characterisation of machining-induced surface integrity and revealing its effect on fatigue life are conducive to structural fatigue life optimisation design. In the present study, surface topography, residual stress, microstructure and micro-hardness were first characterised in peripheral milling of titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V. Then, low-cycle fatigue performances of machined specimens were investigated on the basis of the tension-tension tests. Finally, the effects of surface integrity factors (stress concentration factor, residual stress and micro-hardness) on fatigue performances were discussed. Results show that stress concentration can reduce the fatigue life while increasing the residual compressive stress, and micro-hardness is beneficial to prolonging the fatigue life, but when the surface material of the specimen is subjected to plastic deformation due to yield, the residual stress on the surface is relaxed, and the effect on the fatigue performance is disappeared. Under the condition of residual stress relaxation, the stress concentration factor is the main factor to determine the low-cycle fatigue life of titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V. While for the specimens with no residual stress relaxation, micro-hardness was the key factor to affect the fatigue life, followed by residual stress and stress concentration factor, respectively.