So Just Like Bending a Paper Clip?

A metallurgical failure analysis with an added statistical analysis was conducted on a series of paper clips that had undergone cyclic torsional testing and reversed bend testing to put to rest the concept that reversed bending of a paper clip is an example of a fatigue failure. The paper clips showed characteristics of cold working and subsequent failure due to ductile overload fracture. Performing a Weibull analysis on a separate batch of ten paper clips confirmed that the failure distribution was characteristic of rapid wear out rather than random failure which is typical of fatigue distribution.