Aero-engine components exposed to high mechanical stresses are made of high-strength alloys and additionally, they are surface treated by shot peening. This process introduces compressive residual stress into the material making it less sensitive to stress corrosion cracking and fatigue and therefore benefits the components performance and lifetime. Moreover cold work is induced in an amount depending on the peening parameters. To approximate the remaining lifetime, a quantitative, non-destructive method for stress assessment is required. It was shown that surface treatment of such alloys can be characterized by broadband Rayleigh wave dispersion measurements. However, the relative contributions of residual stress and cold work, respectively, remained an open point. This paper presents the determination of third order elastic constants (TOEC) for IN718 and Ti6246, providing, together with a model for the inversion of dispersion data, a quantitative access to the acoustoelastic effect. Finally, some measurements of differently treated samples are given.
