eng Science and Education Publishing Journal of Mechanical Design and Vibration 2376-9572 2017-05-17 5 1 11 20 10.12691/jmdv-5-1-2 JMDV2017512 article Nicholas G. Garafolo nicholas.g.garafolo@uakron.edu 1 Rachel Collard 1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Akron, Akron, OH 44325, U.S.A. The strong need for high cycle fatigue mitigation has resulted in numerous techniques resulting in added weight, increased operational costs, and lower performance. The experimental investigation presented was a foundational effort towards mitigating HCF through the use of shape memory alloy in a composite system. The research objective was to quantify changes in eigenvalue, eigenvector, and amplitude of a vibrating cantilever beam with a thin SMA topical treatment; as quantified during SMA phase transformations and through comparison with a control. A composite beam consisting of a nitinol thin SMA foil adhered to an Aluminum Alloy 6061 substrate was designed and fabricated. The three configurations were utilized: (1) a full-span SMA treatment designed for maximum eigenvalue shift and maximum amplitude reduction, (2) a half-span SMA treatment designed for eigenvector shift, and (3) a full-span aluminum treatment for a control. Through a complete modal analysis, results illustrated that thin foil SMA treatments led to a significant shift in eigenvalue, up to 6.53%. Highlighting the reduction in amplitude was a 92% reduction in amplitude at second bending with constant excitation frequency with the full-span sample. Spanwise scans on the half-span sample with and without SMA actuation illustrated a 0.77% shift in node location. http://pubs.sciepub.com/jmdv/5/1/2/jmdv-5-1-2.pdf shape memory alloys thin foil vibration high cycle fatigue turbomachinery